


Physical

by melancholymango



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Biting, Blood Drinking, Blood Kink, Dubious Consent, Fitness Trainer Keith (Voltron), Flirting, Getting Together, Happy Ending, Horny Blood Drinking Turned Sex Gone Wrong Content, Lance (Voltron) is Chronically Horny, Light Angst, M/M, Mind Control, Monsterfucking, Murder, Non-Consensual Blood Drinking, Only Read If You Have A Vampire Kink, Pining Lance (Voltron), Rough Sex, Sexual Tension, Switch Keith (Voltron), Switch Lance (Voltron), Vampire Lance (Voltron), Vampire Sex, newly turned vampire, thats just canon but yanno figured i'd add it
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-10-25
Updated: 2019-12-31
Packaged: 2021-01-03 06:57:36
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 48,938
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21175307
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/melancholymango/pseuds/melancholymango
Summary: Lance’s first ever glimpse of the gym owner (Keith, as he’ll later learn) is from the back… and from that point on, he’s fucking sold. Sculpted thick thighs that could crush a watermelon between them, a perky little ass stretching out what are essentially glorified yoga pants, the rippling muscles of his shoulders beneath that flimsy tank top, and a fucking ponytail at the nape of his neck. Fuck.And then Keith turns around and time slows down, roses and hearts appear around Keith’s gorgeous face, and Lance promptly forgets his own name when Keith jogs over and asks him for it.--Lance's crush on his hot fitness trainer Keith was hard enough to navigate from the start, but throw into it the confusion of being a newly-turned vampire with insatiable bloodlust on top of the normal lust? Yeah, it makes for one hell of an exercise in self-control.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Ah, but who would I be if I didn't name this after an Olivia Newton-John song? 
> 
> Also going into this you should know that I have no plans and no updating schedule, this was meant to be a oneshot but I wanted to mess around with the pacing and try to improve my flashback writing skills for the first part? Then it was just a LOT to fit into a oneshot so consider the first chapter like the prologue to the meat of the story.
> 
> And because I know it's gonna happen I feel like I should disclaimer that this is a Lotor hate-free zone. I know he's the go-to bad guy in every story, including canon, and maybe some of my fics, but I really loved him sm as a character bc he was morally grey and wasn't a cookie cutter hero OR villain. I'm sad vld went the route of just diminishing him to a generic villain and letting him become a mini Zarkon because he was so much more than that. Plus he's HOT, I said it, I don't regret it!!!
> 
> ok that's all bye!

See, the thing is, if Lance had ever expected to get turned into a vampire, the last place he would have expected it to happen is in a grocery store. Graveyards? Alleyways after dark? Hell, even the bathroom at a Mcdonald’s in the middle of the day held a more ominous vibe than the frozen food aisle at a Whole Foods.

Maybe that’s why he hadn’t seen it coming. Perhaps it was clever on the vampire’s part...

One second he was giving the pre-packaged veggie bowls a precursory once-over before putting one in his cart, and then the next his face was smushed into the glass door of a freezer full of vegan ice cream. Not exactly an ideal way of advertising, but beneath all the panic and hysteria that sets in fast, Lance can’t help but feel tempted by the mint chocolate chip staring back at him.

That mint chocolate chip is the last thing he ever sees as a living, breathing, human with a heartbeat.

“What do you know about Lotor?”

“Loto-what? I don’t know anything! I don’t even know what that is!”

“Bullshit. I saw him leaving that building not even an hour before you.”

“What building? I don’t understand! Do you want money? I have money, I can-”

Where he’d been expecting the assailant pinning him from behind to grab his wallet and take off, or worst case scenario pull a gun on him… he gets teeth sinking into his neck. It’s a sharp stinging pain for all of a second, and then it’s just a dull discomfort. Not entirely unlike donating blood, you know, if you had to do it from your neck and into a strange homeless man’s mouth rather than a needle.

Immediately, he thinks this guy is wacked on some kind of drugs. That would be the most logical explanation for what’s happening, all things considered. Who would get bitten in a grocery store and immediately let their mind go to vampire rather than meth head? Yeah, no one.

Lance starts to struggle despite how thoroughly he’s pinned against the freezer and how heavy his limbs are starting to feel already. It’s not really any use, the guy must be built like a brick house because even though Lance has been buffing up at the gym for a few months now, he’s got nothing on him.

So, that leads us to plan B. Lance starts to scream like a banshee, sobbing and choking around his words as he begs for someone to save him from his attacker. They’re in the middle of a grocery store, for fuck’s sake, there’s no way that all of the customers chose this moment to be out of earshot. 

He gets all of a few words out before the man behind him snarls and pulls away from his neck. The amount of blood gushing from the wound is immediately apparent. It sends Lance into a panic unlike any other. It’s hot, sticky, as it slides down his neck and soaks into the worn baseball tee he’d worn for his cozy day off. A few drops drip heavily enough to hit the linoleum floor between his widespread feet, some splatters across the glass of the freezer door, and if Lance squints he can just barely make out the stranger’s face in the reflection and it’s absolutely fucking covered with red. With blood. His blood.

Oh god, did he just get his throat torn out? He’s not sure he can survive losing this much blood from such a vital area. 

But before he can fully regress into a state of useless chicken-with-its-head-cut-off panic, the man behind him grips his hair and yanks his head back to rest against his shoulder. Lance trembles in fear, wants to throw a punch or a well-aimed donkey kick to where it hurts. But the man just laughs at him.

“Submit. You _ want _ this.” The man says, evenly, with a confidence that’s really unwarranted given that Lance really does _ not _ fucking want any part of this. But then he feels his jaw go slack, his joints go loose and limber, the struggle leaving him all in one sweep. He feels drugged, as he tilts his head to the side and willingly offers up the other side of his neck to the stranger.

The man dives back in and drinks his blood with such a ferocity that soon the dim flickering light overhead is fading away into complete darkness. Lance knows that he’s probably dying, but somehow that thought doesn’t scare him as much as it should. Or at all. He might even be smiling when his heart stops beating, he’s not sure, he’s a little too out of it to tell. 

The only things that he dazedly registers is the PA system lighting up with a screaming employee, saying something about an evacuation with none of the calm reassuring tone that they’re supposed to use in these situations.

Then, when the PA crackles out… Lance has to give a tired, gurgled laugh as the absolute banger that is Tom Jones’ “What’s New Pussycat?” plays through the speakers instead.

What a way to die, really. It’s kind-of hilarious. A story for his funeral, for sure.

\--

But let’s rewind a little bit, to the months before Lance’s death.

He’s just turned twenty-six, his apartment has coasters on_ all _of the coffee tables, and he’s on a waiting list with the local rescue group for a dog. He loves his job and the people he works with. He has enough money to go home and see his family in Cuba at least three times a year. He’s gonna be an uncle again soon. And he’s pretty sure that he’s maybe met the love of his life… possibly. 

He doesn’t wanna get his hopes up, but he’s absolutely gushed about his crush to his best friend, every last one of his siblings, all of his coworkers, and both his parents. You know, keeping it lowkey.

Keith Kogane… where to begin, honestly. Lance could probably go on about him for hours, he definitely has in the past when he gets into one of his rants about the other boy. There’s just so much to him, an air of mystery and bluntness alike. Lance has to discuss it, has to try and make sense of it, but he hasn’t come to any conclusions yet.

Keith is the most take-no-bullshit kinda guy Lance has ever met, he’s straight to the point and almost hilariously upfront about his intentions. Yet, despite spending six hours a week in his presence, Lance doesn’t actually know anything about the guy beyond the surface-level facts.

Surface-level Keith facts: 

  1. He runs and _owns_ a gym. He took a couple courses to become a personal fitness trainer and now here he is, running his own _business_ somehow. That must mean he’s resourceful and smart with money… or just racking up debt and living life on the edge.
  2. When you say something that Keith actually finds funny beyond the obligatory chuckle, his eyes crinkle at the corners and little dimples appear in the hollows of his cheeks. He_ snorts_ when he laughs really hard and it’s the cutest thing Lance has ever had the privilege of seeing.
  3. He’s fucking hot. Could probably throw Lance around like a bag of potatoes, over his shoulder, over a desk, down to his knees. Hell, Lance doesn’t exactly care. He’s just ready to be manhandled by those unfairly muscular arms.

At the time of his death, Lance has spent six hours a week in Keith’s presence for three months. 

And those three facts are all that Lance has really learnt about him. He has the barest understanding of Keith's family situation, and how to read his emotions that he displays so unwillingly, but that's it. It isn’t exactly the most impressive treasure trove of information, but he’s working with what he’s got. Keith is an intensely private person.

\--

When Lance first walks into the tiny gym that a coworker had recommended to him, his expectations are monumentally low. The exterior of the building is rugged and unkempt, not to mention the sign for the business looks like it was hand-painted in the dark. It hardly looks like the kind of place Lance is gonna turn his life around in. 

Though, to be fair, even the most impressive of gyms wouldn’t inspire much confidence in him right now. He’s only here because he’s gained a whopping fifteen pounds since his promotion at work and he knows that his sisters and brothers will mercilessly point it out and tease him when he goes home for Christmas break. When you only see each other a few times a year, it’s easy to notice physical changes.

The interior of the gym is surprisingly nice, despite being very rugged and plain, without a decoration in sight aside from one of those little solar-powered dancing flowers sitting on the window sill next to the front desk. The front desk which hosts another hand-written sign, rather than a person. Someone really needs to offer to help this poor bastard because Lance is pretty sure he has no idea what he’s doing running this business.

The sign lets him know to head right into the gym area itself if he wants to talk to an employee. 

So he does, because he isn’t the level of uncommitted where he’s going to just walk straight back out, he has to at least convince himself he’s giving it an honest effort. You know, before inevitably never coming back for a single appointment and resigning to being fifteen pounds heavier for the rest of his life.

Lance’s first ever glimpse of the gym owner (Keith, as he’ll later learn) is from the back… and from that point on, he’s fucking sold. Sculpted thick thighs that could crush a watermelon between them, a perky little ass stretching out what are essentially glorified yoga pants, the rippling muscles of his shoulders beneath that flimsy tank top, and a fucking ponytail at the nape of his neck. Fuck.

And then Keith turns around and time slows down, roses and hearts appear around Keith’s gorgeous face, and Lance promptly forgets his own name when Keith jogs over and asks him for it.

“Are you lost or something?” Keith asks with a quiet little chuckle, tilting his head to peer up at Lance from behind the curtain of his bangs. Lance isn’t capable of much more than a stupid smile and a quick reassurance that he’s actually here to workout, at which point Keith offers to see to him at the front desk so they can discuss potential plans in privacy.

Three hundred dollars a week for eight weeks. That’s the cheapest and most noncommittal plan that Keith offers when it comes to personal one-on-one training. Sure, Lance could just get a membership and help himself to all the gym equipment whenever he sees fit, but now that he knows being personally trained by Keith is an option…

It’s the most expensive thing Lance has ever bought. He’s not exactly the same broke college student he was a couple years ago, he has a cushy office job that gives him raises and paid vacation time, but fuck if he doesn’t flinch a little bit as the debit machine informs him that the down payment is approved. 

And Keith just looks up at him, with this coy little smirk and a flash of amethyst eyes. Immediately, Lance forgets about the money spent, it’s worth it. That gaze is _ dangerous _, more-so than the muscles or the cute ass that Keith flaunts around. That gaze could bring soldiers to their knees.

“I look forward to working with you, Mr. McClain. I think we’re gonna have _ a lot _ of fun together.”

\--

Lance_ does _end up working off the extra fifteen pounds in record time that first month, but he’s not sure if it’s from the harsh workouts Keith puts him through... or the furious pace he beats his meat after every single session. Whatever, who is he to question the methods when they’re clearly working?

\--

Two months in and they’re sort-of at that awkward stage where Lance is pretty sure Keith has clued in to the fact that there’s sexual tension between them. Every time he leans over the machine Lance is working out on, it takes all of the self-control Lance has not to pop a stiffy right then and there. 

But there’s no way Keith hasn’t noticed his struggle by now, especially because more often than not it results in a failure and Lance has to impishly excuse himself to the bathroom and will away his boner.

To Keith’s defense, he’s been pretty casual about it. He doesn’t act any differently around Lance now than he did in the beginning. On the one hand, it’s devastating because that probably means he isn’t interested, or is already taken. On the other hand, it’s a relief because Lance has genuinely been starting to enjoy going to the gym after being committed this long and he’d hate for his damn crush to ruin this for him. His body looks better than it ever has. He’s sort-of ripped, in his own right. Sure, he’s always been a slim and fit type of guy, but he’s never been able to see this amount of muscle definition. That’s all thanks to Keith, and he couldn’t be happier with how he looks in the mirror as of late.

It’s sort-of hard to find it within himself to express his thankfulness right now though, as Keith has him doing a hundred squats while holding ten pound barbells in either hand. And the worst part is, Keith couldn’t even stick around to egg him on throughout it, another client needing help figuring out the elliptical on the other side of the gym where people can come in to work without a trainer.

Lance pays for his undivided attention, damn it. He’d never dream of complaining though, he sort of admires Keith’s dedication to the job. Running this place and being the only employee can’t be an easy feat and if the growing amount of customers in the gym every morning is anything to go by, he’s doing a damn good job of it. Lance feels his chest swell with pride.

A good ten minutes later and Keith saunters back over to him. Lance’s entire face is screwed up with the effort he’s putting into the exercise, eyes glaring at the floor. So he doesn’t actually see Keith until he’s standing right in front of him, those ugly fitness sneakers staring back at Lance.

“How are we holding up over here, champ?” 

“Can’t feel my legs.” Lance pants out, as he brings himself back up from another squat. He hardly gives himself the chance to look at Keith before he’s lowering back down, feeling the burn through his thighs.

“Come on, it’s the same amount of squats you do everyday, just with slightly heavier barbells. I mean, if anything, you should be feeling it in your arms more.” Keith says it conversationally, then kneels in front of him to hold eye contact while Lance lifts and drops himself with practiced ease. God, this is unfair, Lance feels like a pig on a treadmill with a carrot dangled in front of his face. It’s hard not to put his 110% into everything he does when Keith is watching, invested in his progress. 

“I’m gonna die.” Lance huffs out dramatically, blowing the hair out of his eyes. Keith rolls his eyes at him, walks away to grab a yoga ball and roll it back over. Then he sits his cute ass down on it, right in front of Lance. He looks so relaxed, so leisurely, almost amused as Lance strains every muscle in his fucking body. 

“You can do it. You’re almost there.” 

“I_ can’t _.”

“If you put as much effort into the exercise as you put into whining about it, you’d probably be done by now. Think about that, yeah?” Keith tells him, but there’s nothing professional about it. It isn’t advice, it’s something more playful than that. Lately Keith has been surprising him a little bit, playing into Lance’s terrible attempts at flirty one-liners and childish teasing.

“Yeah, well, maybe if you didn’t push me so hard I wouldn’t have to-” Lance forgets what he was about to say, nearly drops the barbells in his hands because what the fuck. Keith is reaching up behind his head with one hand, tugging on the elastic holding his hair back. Then he pulls it free, shoulder-length hair falling in loose waves at his shoulders, damp with sweat. 

Fuck. 

Lance has never seen Keith with his hair down before this moment, with his legs widespread on either side of a yoga ball, eyes trained to Lance like he’s the most fascinating thing in the entire room. And the worst part is, Keith must be able to see it on his face, how badly he’s undressing Keith’s sexy body with his eyes all over again.

If he does, he doesn’t say a word about it. Just reaches down to pick up a water bottle off the floor and crack it open. He tips it back and drinks almost hastily and Lance finds himself pausing mid-squat, forgetting about the exercise entirely to zero in on where Keith’s hasty drinking has droplets of water running down his jaw and then following the line of his throat down, down, down… disappearing between the slight divet between his pecs.

What Lance would _ give _ to get his cock right _ there _ , to frame it with Keith’s stupid muscular tits and thrust into that slick space. The line of Keith’s cleavage is always just barely visible above the neckline of those low-cut tank tops he wears and it drives Lance up the wall to see. He’d pay three _ thousand _ a week, no questions asked, even just to shove his face there and happily suffocate himself to death in Keith’s sweaty chest. The mere thought has him threatening to get hard in his joggers.

“Did I _ say _ you could take a break?” Keith asks, eyebrows furrowing together, lips twitching with the urge to smile at Lance’s expense. It’s not a genuine question, it’s too playful again. God, Keith must be feeling some type of way today because if Lance didn’t know any better, he’d almost say that he’s _ flirting _.

Lance hastily goes back to work, lifts and drops himself, ignores the burn.

“Done.” Lance blurts out, dropping the barbells carelessly on the expensive gym floor. Keith shoots him a withering look, but even that isn’t enough to calm the racing of Lance’s heart, his pulse jumping in his neck in a way that’s not entirely due to the exertion. Damn it, he’s not gonna be able to think this one away, he’s gonna get hard again mid-workout. He’s such a_ fiend. _

Lance straightens up and stands, stretching his arms high above his head. Keith stays where he is in front of him on that yoga ball, idly bouncing on it, looking up the line of Lance’s body. And Lance tries so hard not to think about the fact that Keith is at the perfect height level to lean forward and duck his head down between Lance’s legs, to take that rapidly filling-out cock into his mouth and-

“Here.” Keith holds out the water bottle. The one he’d been drinking from. Lance freezes and lets his eyes go comically wide, but he accepts what he’s being offered. His fingers brush against Keith’s and it feels like an electric current shooting up his arm.

“Is this for me?” Lance asks, just to be sure. He can’t really wrap his head around the idea that _ Keith’s _ lips were just wrapped around the head of the water bottle, suckling at it and coaxing the water to roll down his throat. Damn it, damn it, damn it, he’s gonna have to excuse himself to the bathroom real quick.

“You’re sweating buckets, figured you should re-hydrate when you stop for a break and_ you_ never think of those things. Guess I’ve gotta take care of your body in more ways than one, huh?” Keith points out, getting to his feet abruptly and giving Lance a sluggish punch to the shoulder. Lance tries to pretend his cock doesn’t give a pathetic twitch in response to the thought of Keith actually punching him. He’s so depraved at this point, he’d probably get off on being beaten up by those fists, even if Keith insists on covering them with fingerless gloves for some godforsaken reason.

Keith turns to walk away, to give Lance a few minutes reprieve before they start onto the next part of the routine he’s made for Lance today. And the perfectly respectable thing to do would be to just let him go, to unscrew the water bottle and drink and rejuvenate himself. 

Instead, he stares at Keith’s ass as he walks away. He watches the way that booty shifts with each step, flexing against the smooth fabric covering it like a second skin. He’d pay three _ million _to get his cock there, would spend the rest of his life indebted to Keith and his stupidly sexy ass.

“Buddy, you can take care of my body in as many ways as you want.” Lance mutters under his breath, tips the water bottle back to chug some down. He closes his eyes, tries not to be creepy and think about Keith’s mouth drinking from this same bottle. He’s a depraved horny bastard, yeah, but he’s not a creep.

“Yeah?” Keith’s voice startles him so much he spits out water all over himself. He whips his head around, to where Keith has turned around to look at him, hands on his hips and lips curled into a smirk that says he definitely heard Lance just now. Oh fuck. Maybe that was too forward? Lance has been trying to be casual about it, and that was anything but. He’s about to apologize for being so unprofessional about it, but then Keith winks at him. He fucking _ winks _.

Lance is so gone for this boy. “Might have to take you up on that offer.”

Take… him up… on that_ offer _…

Is Keith saying what it _sounds_ like he’s saying? 

Because to the untrained ear, it sounds like Keith is saying that he’d fuck him. Something in Lance’s brain absolutely short-circuits at the mere idea of his affections and desires being returned. He’d given up on that pretty early on, had tried in vain to convince himself that it was enough to keep working out and admiring Keith from afar. Sure, they chatted and joked around, they were probably more than just a client and a trainer at this point… but they weren’t on mutual flirting level. Or, at least, Lance didn’t think they were, but Keith seems to think differently.

“_ Really _?!” 

“Twenty push-ups after this, hit the deck.” Keith deadpans. Very unsexily, if you ask Lance. It must show on his face too, his utter disappointment, because then Keith does one of those heavy laughs. You know the ones, eyes crinkled and cheeks dimpled, snorts a little bit. And Lance forgets all about how horny he is, because every part of him aside from his dick is impossibly _ soft _. “What? I’m taking care of your body. You'll thank me for pushing you so hard down the road."

“That’s _ so _not what I meant and you _know_ it’s not!”

“But you’re gonna do it anyway, aren’t you? You love showing off your muscles and there are a _ lot _ of women in spandex here today.” Keith steps closer, drops his voice to something quiet and personal, for only the two of them. Lance finds himself leaning subconsciously closer, into Keith's space, until he can smell the musk of sweat beneath sweet smelling deodorant. Lance's heart absolutely races as his eyes meet Keith's, dark with intent.

“Keith, what kinda guy do you take me for?” Lance rolls his eyes. 

“A promiscuous one.” Keith answers without missing a single beat, like the accusation has been on the tip of his tongue for a while now. He lifts an eyebrow and gives Lance a long, hard look that really says it all. And then he walks away, just like that, not another word on the topic and no promise that they’ll ever revisit it again.

Alright, maybe Lance has been a little bit _ too _ forward, maybe he’s made himself known as the depraved horny type of guy that checks out everyone at the gym. But he doesn’t want Keith to have that idea, to think that Lance flirts with just anyone like he flirts with _ him _. Lance admires everyone he sees, he’s just that kinda guy, flexible like that. Does Keith honestly think that Lance isn't taking this seriously, though? Surely he has to realize that Lance doesn't see it as something fleeting and lighthearted.

He flirts with everyone, sure, but there’s no one he’d give up everything to be with like he would Keith. Keith is _ special _. 

As much as Lance _maybe_ objectifies Keith’s body, there’s so much more to it than that. He wants so much more than a quick one night stand or hasty hook-up. He doesn’t just want to use Keith to get off and then be on his merry way. In fact, he’d be perfectly happy if sex between them was never on the table. Hell, up until this very second, he’d more or less come to the understanding that it wasn’t.

And yet he still showed up to the gym every week. He can lie all he wants and say its because he likes the way it makes his body look, but he’s got a history of cancelled gym memberships dating all the way back to when he was a teenager that say otherwise. He never sticks with it. Nothing has ever made him want to stay like Keith has. 

If this is the only way he ever gets to have Keith, then he’ll happily and thankfully take it.

Because the boy is… unlike anyone else Lance has ever met. He’s sweet and awkward, harsh and serious, aloof but oh so aware, wise beyond his years, kind beyond what his hardened-look and the scar on his cheek would have you assume. Keith is an enigma, beautiful and fascinating, like a complex puzzle that’s impossible to solve. Lance loves every part of him.

It’s just easier to openly express his love for Keith’s body than it is to express love for the rest of him, because Keith makes a point not to _ show _ the rest of himself. He’s private and reserved about his personal life and his personality, whereas he shows that body off with pride (as he should! It’s a damn good body! Lance is doing the opposite of complaining about that!). 

But Lance would happily forfeit sex with Keith for the chance to get to _ know _Keith, make no mistake.

\--

If anything, it’s Keith’s fault. He was the one that went and had a full-length floor to ceiling mirror installed along one wall in the locker rooms. Seriously, what did he expect people to use that for? Just because Keith was one of those too-good-to-take-selfies types doesn’t mean all his patrons shared the same mentality. Or, more specifically, that Lance did.

There was just something about the post-workout look that Lance couldn’t replicate in any of his selfies anywhere after leaving the gym. The sheen of sweat to his tan skin, the way his hair fell out of the gel’s hold and into his eyes, and don’t even get him started on how much more pronounced his muscles looked after a workout. He’s pretty sure he’s not imagining it. Maybe Keith bought a magic mirror that makes people look hotter on purpose as incentive to keep coming back to his gym. 

Right now, Lance has one leg propped up on the bench, showing off the arch of his well-defined calves. One hand is holding the camera, the other has slid down his body to fit lewdly around the outline of his cock in his grey sweatpants. He’s shirtless, because of course he is, and he maybe got distracted halfway through changing out of his gym clothes. Whatever, he has the whole locker room to himself.

He snaps a few photos, changing his expression in all of them. Puppy dog pout, tongue lolled out, toothy smile, seductive smolder-

“Do you have someone you're sending these to or something?” Keith’s voice is undoubtedly amused. Lance is mortified as he scrambles down from the bench and whirls around to face him, cheeks flushed in total embarrassment. Keith just gives him this lopsided smile, lets his eyes rove up and down Lance’s body, and in any other context Lance would preen under the attention but right now it feels mocking. He's never felt so exposed in his life.

“Jesus, don’t sneak up on a guy like that. Post-workout selfie time at the gym is a_ very _private ritual.”

“Mm, seems like it. You were practically eye-fucking yourself there before I interrupted.” Maybe it’s because this is the most private place they’ve interacted, but Lance doesn’t think he’s imagining the heat between them right now. Keith’s voice is definitely lower than usual, dripping with intent as he walks closer to stand beside him.

“Can you blame me?” Lance jokes to try and lighten the mood. He doesn’t look right at Keith, can’t bring himself to, so he searches out his reflection in the mirror. Keith isn’t looking at him either, he looks distracted as he stares toward the floor. Lance takes the opportunity to gesture to the whole of himself, make a spectacle of himself again. “Just_ look _at me, I’m one hot piece of meat.”

And Keith does look at him. Again. His eyes explore the entire expanse of Lance’s bare chest with the help of the mirror. His gaze is hungry, especially when that pink tongue darts out to wet his lips.

Keith sits down on the bench Lance had just been using as a prop. He pats the space next to him and Lance reluctantly sits down, ready for the hazing and the teasing that’s probably coming his way. He knows he gets a little bit too into it sometimes, has been told more than once that he’s too obsessed with himself. 

What he’s not expecting is for Keith to go along with it like he does.

“Let’s take one together. I’ll put it on the company Instagram page.”

“The one you only post on like once a month?” Lance asks, genuinely confused that maybe he’s been following the wrong page this whole time because as far as he knows, Keith never posts photos of himself on that page. And he knows pretty well, considering how extensively he scoured the entire profile looking for just one photo of Keith that he could show his best friend Hunk, so he had a face to associate with the hottie trainer that Lance goes to see.

“Shut-up. I’m a fitness trainer, I’m not a social media manager and I can’t afford to hire one.” Keith snaps back at him, but it’s lighthearted. Lance rolls his eyes fondly, but he doesn’t say another word before holding his phone up and snapping a quick unexpected picture of them in the mirror. He’s not one to look a gift horse in the mouth. He’s been wanting a photo of Keith for months now, if it can be a photo of them together then that’s even better.

“I wasn’t even looking!” Keith hisses, snatching his phone out of his hand. Lance doesn’t bother fighting him on it, just laughs and leans back on the bench. Keith is delightfully bad at taking photos, tries in vain to get the absolute perfect shot rather than taking a slew of photos and hoping one turns out decent. 

Lance fits an arm around his shoulders, grabs the phone back and switches it around to the front facing camera so they can both look up at it together. Keith looks… delightfully bashful, cheeks flushed a cute shade of pink that Lance can hardly resist staring at even as the camera takes a few pictures.

Then, for good measure, Lance takes a couple in the mirror as well. He gestures for Keith to get to his feet and then strikes a few Johnny Bravo-esque poses to lighten the mood, flexing his muscles so hard they strain. Keith rolls his eyes, assumes a more casual stance but smiles into the mirror all the same.

By the end of it, as they’re standing side-by-side and looking through the gallery worth of photos, there’s at least a handful of them that are acceptable to post on a business page. Keith seems overly pleased by them, possibly because he’s never taken a good selfie in his life. He hums and haws over which one is best to post and Lance can absolutely tell it’s only because he has no idea what criteria he’s looking for.

“I’ll do it for you.” Lance tells him gently, giving him a lazy grin. He'd made up his mind pretty much the moment Keith admitted that that was, in fact, his company business page that only got posted to once a month. The dude needs Lance's help and Lance is more than happy to give it. Keith seems a little bit distracted, eyes still glued to the screen of Lance’s phone, admiring them together. He doesn't realize what Lance is saying at first, gives a halfhearted hum of intrigue. “Manage your business account, if you want. It’s _ kinda _my thing, I work at a marketing firm.”

That grabs Keith’s attention much faster.

“Seriously?” He asks, turning to Lance with wide hopeful eyes. 

“It only makes sense, I’m here three times a week anyway and I know the regulars almost as well as you do. I think I’d be good at it.” Lance feels indescribably nervous all the sudden, now that he’s finally got Keith looking at him like that. There’s not even anything flirty or sexually tense about it, it’s just straight up adoration. Keith looks like Lance just offered him the world on a silver platter and it’s a little much to wrap his head around. He doesn’t feel like he’s earned such a soft expression. 

In typical Lance fashion, he panics and ruins the good things he’s given in life. He takes a step backward, adjusts the phone in his hands, gets that bodacious booty in frame, and snaps a photo. Keith whips around to stare at him. Lance gives a sleazy wink. “Plus, I know all your best assets to advertise.”

“Did you just take a photo of my ass?”

“I’m a generous guy, Keith, but I’m no saint. I never said I’d work for free.” Lance drawls, pocketing his phone with a shrug. He half expects Keith to punch him, he doesn’t exactly seem like the kind of guy who has a lot of patience for pervy bullshit. At the very least, he expects Keith to wrench his phone out of his hands and delete the photo to prove a point.

He does neither of those things.

Keith draws a heavy breath, shakes his head with a smile on his lips that’s only fond. He walks away. He turns and walks past Lance, giving him a friendly pat on the chest as he goes. Hell, if Lance isn’t mistaken, he might even honk on the titty a little bit. Squeezing Lance’s pec just barely enough to feel it before heading for the door. The ass photo thoroughly not mentioned.

“I’ll text you the log-in information.” Keith calls back to him. “Have a nice night, Lance.”

“Y-Yeah, you too.”

_ What the hell was that about?! _

\--

Lance is leaning back against the wall next to the locker rooms after his workout, lingering around in hopes of getting the chance to say goodbye to Keith. He’s freshly-showered, smells like fucking peaches and cream, all fruity and tropical. He’s got his gym bag slung over his shoulder, a juice box hanging limply between his teeth, and his phone resting in the palm of his hand as he idly scrolls through his socials. 

Now it’s just a matter of waiting to see how long it takes Keith to notice him.

He hunkers down on the benches, prepared for a good long wait because today is a Wednesday and Keith _ always _has a private client lined up right after he’s finished with Lance. 

She’s a pretty girl, Keith’s other Wednesday morning client. Long, blonde hair and bright blue eyes, she’s giggly and excitable, eager to go along with anything Keith directs her to do. He’s good about it, always the professional one given how seriously he takes his work, but at this point Lance prides himself in knowing Keith at least well enough to know that he’s not enjoying himself. 

Keith looks almost uncomfortable, the more glances Lance sneaks away from his phone and in their direction. More than once, Lance catches him hiding a grimace or a scowl behind his arm. The girl seems oblivious to it though, making conversation throughout her entire appointment. At one point, Keith attempts to give her a demonstration of how to use the weight-lifting machine and she reaches out and honest to god caresses his bicep.

Even from across the room, Lance can see the tense vein bulging in Keith’s neck as he struggles to keep from physically reacting in repulsion. And that’s the moment Lance finally feels comfortable in assuming that Keith is more than likely gay. Or taken.

Nevermind after that, when she leans over him mid-crunch and he nearly face-plants into her breasts only to launch backward a solid four feet to put space between them.

And then she takes her top off to reveal the expensive sports bra underneath, under the guise of being too hot, and Keith looks like he’s about to combust as he politely looks the other way.

Before Lance realizes, he’s sat through her entire appointment watching the way they interact and drawing subtle comparisons to his own time with Keith. As much as he doesn’t want to get his hopes up or get a bigger ego than he already has, he can’t deny that Keith definitely seems happier when they’re together. He may be hard to read most of the time, but this has really put it into perspective for Lance.

By the end of it, Lance is stifling laughter and hiding his smile behind the sleeve of his sweater, as he watches Keith bend the girl over and guide her body into cool-down stretches against the soft mats covering the floor. She seems all too happy to lie back and let Keith manhandle her body into place, to push her thighs back and work the sore muscles there.

There’s no denying the relief on Keith’s face when she finally bids him farewell and then heads toward the locker rooms. Lance feels a little bit bad when she offers him a wide smile on her way past, so he gives her a flirty wink and hopes it makes her day. Maybe she’s totally barking up the wrong tree with Keith, but that’s not her fault, she seems like a lovely lady.

She nearly trips over her workout sneakers in surprise, but then gives Lance a shy wave before disappearing into the locker rooms. It’s definitely cute, Lance decides as he grins after her.

“What are you still doing here?” Lance jumps in surprise when Keith’s boot lands heavily on the bench next to him, shaking the entire thing. He looks up at Keith, watches him bite into an apple and chew with all the grace of a horse, eyes trained on Lance’s face in what could be mistaken as a glare.

See, as blunt and unimpressed as that sounds, after spending nearly three months in Keith’s presence Lance can confidently say that he’s 75% sure Keith is actually happy to see him and just doing a poor job of showing it. He’s not exactly the type for mushy gushy feelings, and even expressing the barest hint of positivity toward someone’s presence seems to border too close to affection for him.

Besides, maybe Keith caught him staring at the blonde cutie and is feeling_ jealous _?

“Pretty sure that poor girl almost creamed her pants when you stretched her legs out above her head, talk about a low blow. I mean, damn, you really need to work on controlling all of that.”

“Controlling all of _ what _?” 

“You know, the untamed raw sex appeal thing.” Lance gestures vaguely to the whole of Keith, gives a little indifferent shrug. Keith’s bushy eyebrows are hiking up toward his hairline and Lance is starting to wonder if maybe he said too much. He’s not trying to reveal his own feelings, thank-you very much.

“Oh?” Keith muses, lips quirking. “This is news to me. Please, feel free to elaborate.”

“You know what I’m talking about, don’t play dumb. Hot guy with muscles, wearing tight fitting clothing, always kinda sweaty? The long hair and the pretty face is just the icing on the cake.” Lance explains it as objectively as he can, tries desperately not to show how affected he is by that same untamed raw sex appeal he’s mocking right now. This whole argument is counterproductive and way too damning for his liking, but he doesn’t know how to stop it now that he’s started so Lance just keeps right on rambling his way into a corner. “To be honest, I’m pretty sure half your customers are only here because they think they have a shot at getting in your pants.”

Keith’s eyes widen just the slightest bit where he’s been staring blankly at Lance this entire time. He’s not one for big reactions, or even visible reactions whatsoever, so that’s how Lance knows that he’s definitely gone too far this time. He’s crossed some invisible boundary between them, pushed Keith’s buttons a little bit too hard and now they’ve stuck in place.

Was that rude? Offensive maybe? An insult to Keith’s skill as a trainer?

Lance wishes he could take it back and unsay it, but he doesn’t think it’s possible to backtrack on that.

“So, tell me which half _ you _fall under?”

Lance blinks owlishly at Keith as he processes the question.

“M-Me?” He asks innocently, receiving a bored look in response. Keith isn’t a fan of bullshit, or mind games, or beating around the bush. He says and does everything exactly how he pleases. “Keith, how many times do I have to tell you? I’m dedicated to the health and physical well-being of my body, first and foremost. Our relationship is strictly formal.”

“Yeah?” Keith doesn’t look convinced. In fact, Keith looks uncharacteristically mischievous, which can’t be a good sign at all, no matter how aesthetically good it looks. “Maybe next time I’ll lay you out on the mats like that too, huh? Stretch your thighs out, get you nice and loose before you go home. Get you so hot that you have to start taking your clothes off.”

“Is that a threat or a promise?” Lance croaks out, incapable of much else as he imagines exactly what Keith is describing to him. It must show too, because then Keith is stepping closer and leaning over him, hand braced on the wall overhead. An embarrassing peep leaves Lance’s lips before he can help it, as he tilts his head back to look up at_ Keith _.

“You’re paying for me, Lance, all you have to do is tell me what you want.”

“Don’t say it like _ that _, Jesus Christ.” Lance breathes, a full-body shiver jolting through him. Keith doesn’t even give him the reprieve of pretending not to notice it either. He openly acknowledges Lance’s reaction this time, gaze dropping to stare at his lap, almost expectant. If Lance had any doubt before that Keith’s somehow not noticed the chronic boner situation, now he knows.

Lance has never slammed his legs closed so very fast in his life. “This is exactly what I’m talking about! Untamed raw sex appeal!”

“Hm. Interesting. Well, if it keeps getting me customers then I’m gonna keep playing into it.” Keith breathes out, reaching up to brush his hair back from his eyes. He gives Lance a final nod of acknowledgement and then turns to leave, sauntering off in the direction of the front desk. Lance watches him leave in a daze, only blinking himself back to reality when Keith is nearly out of sight around the corner.

“Oh, so _now_ you’re aware of it?! I see how it is. The aloof act only goes so far, Kogane!” Lance shouts after him stubbornly, only to receive nothing in response. He feels oddly affronted, like Keith just took a page out of Lance’s book and played the same game, only to do it so much better. 

How does Keith always do that anyway? Lance will say something quick-witted and flirty, and Keith will instantly come back with something that leaves him flustered to the point of stuttering over his words. For someone so socially inept, he's infuriatingly good at this back and forth, he keeps pace with Lance and doesn't even break a sweat.

\--

It’s not exactly the most responsible thing Lance has ever done, swinging by the gym when he’s already running so late for plans he’d made weeks ago. He tries to convince himself that he’ll only be a couple minutes at most, but that’s a thinly-veiled lie and he knows it. Now that him and Keith are on friendship terms and they actually talk beyond flirting, all of Lance’s one minute visits turn into one hour visits.

He’s not complaining, oh boy, is he ever not complaining. 

Lance is a little bit surprised to see that Keith hasn’t turned the open sign around yet, despite it being a good ten minutes past. He slips inside out of the cool weather and turns it around for him, ensures that they won’t end up being interrupted. The gym is cozy, with a clean Earthy smell about it and quiet rock music playing from the outdated stereo on the welcome desk. Lance rolls his eyes as he shrugs his coat off and hangs it up. Typical Keith, nothing says welcome to my gym and make yourself at home quite like “Welcome to the Jungle” by Guns N’ Roses.

He heads through the wide-open doors and into the gym itself, rather than the welcome area. It’s delightfully quiet, not a single person around. Sadly, that includes Keith, which leaves a lot of questions unanswered. For Keith to leave the place open and unlocked, but not be around to watch it? That’s more than a little out of character for him.

Lance heads toward the locker rooms, the last possible room he could be in.

There are quiet voices from inside and Lance immediately goes quiet, wonders if he’s intruding on something he shouldn’t be. Luckily, he has decades of experience when it comes to sneaking around and eavesdropping, being the meddling younger sibling that he is.

He ducks around the corner of the door and flattens himself against the wall, stays perfectly silent as he tunes in to the conversation happening. One of the voices is definitely Keith’s, he immediately recognizes it. But it’s different than he’s used to. It’s not calm and composed, so impassive that it could be mistaken as disinterested. No, instead it’s pitchy and panicked, and Keith is obviously frazzled by something.

“Look, I’m doing all that I can! The bastards aren’t exactly easy to track down when they don’t wanna be found. It’s not like they’re gonna come to me and I can’t spend every waking hour scanning the city. We need to come up with a better strategy. Soon.”

“Fine. This isn’t the place to discuss it, though.” The other voice replies in a quiet hush and now that Lance is close enough to make it out clearer, he hears a posh British accent behind the words. He can’t remember Keith ever having a customer with an accent like that, he definitely would have remembered it. Lance can’t even see the guy, but he _ sounds _ hot.

Sadly, he doesn’t get to hear him anymore. Everything is unsettlingly silent and Lance is starting to wonder if they’ve maybe left the room somehow through the back exit of the building. He’s about ready to politely excuse himself back to the waiting area, or maybe forgo the visit altogether and go to the party he’d been supposed to be at half an hour ago.

But then someone walks around the corner and Lance promptly forgets his plans of leaving, forgets he has the ability to move at all. He’s never seen a more beautiful man in his life, with dark skin and long flowing white hair, sharp features to match. He gives Lance a tense smile, but then he turns back to where he came from. “You have a customer.”

“Hey, I’m really sorry for any inconveniences, but we’re actually closed for the evening n-” Keith comes walking around the corner after the man next, a hand pushing the hair back from his face as he comes into view. He looks exhausted. His hair is a mess, likely post-workout and post-ponytail if the fluffy waves are anything to go by. His thick eyebrows are scrunched together in deep thought, lips curled down into a scowl, eyes dark and distracted. 

He does light up slightly when he follows the stranger’s line of sight back to Lance though, and that does funny things to Lance’s heart. “_ Lance _?”

“Heya, tall buff and brooding, what’s up?” Lance greets him as casually as he can, painstakingly aware of the stranger glancing back and forth between them, spectating silently and passing judgment. Keith doesn’t seem to mind, he’s completely zoned in on Lance, attention thoroughly hoarded. 

“What are you doing here?” 

“I know, you don’t usually get to see my handsome self on the weekends. You’ve truly been blessed.” He jokes, giving a little coy shrug of his shoulders. The stranger gives a quiet chuckle at that, amusement shining through in those otherwise unreadable eyes. At least he has a sense of humor because up until now, Lance had been under the impression this guy hated him. He’s too composed, carries himself with an air of indifference that feels almost condescending. He’s definitely rich, even though he’s dressed in baggy workout gear and not wearing anything visibly expensive, Lance can just _ tell _.

“A blessing or a curse, depending on how you look at it.” Keith jokes dryly, but even as he says it he steps closer and slings an arm around Lance’s shoulders. It’s not that it’s particularly monumental for them, Keith has definitely done it a dozen times over to support him after a harsh workout. It just feels different for Keith to do it in front of someone else that he knows personally. Lance can’t help but let his eyes drift back to the stranger, feeling maybe the slightest bit smug as he shows off his relationship with Keith like it's something to brag about. 

But… the guy doesn’t look bothered by it, he doesn’t look judgmental or jealous or anything of the sort.

He’s not smiling, but Lance is starting to gather that that’s a rare sight to see anyway.

“I should get going.” The stranger announces to no one in particular, tucking a long strand of hair behind his ear. Keith’s gaze whips back around to him, seemingly disappointed by the development. His arm around Lance’s shoulders tenses slightly, pulls him in closer subconsciously.

“You can stay if you want, I’ve just gotta close up and then we could get dinner or something.” Keith is hopeful about it, a little smile worming its way across his face. Lance looks between the two of them curiously, desperately trying to pinpoint the nature of their relationship. He doesn’t think it’s romantic, at least not right now, but maybe they’re exes...

“Unfortunately, I have business to attend to. I’ll take a raincheck on dinner though.” The man actually does smile then and Lance is blindsided by the pearly white teeth, the kindness in his eyes. Alright, if this is the dude Keith’s banging then Lance can’t even be mad, he gets it. He understands, as much as it’ll break his heart into a million pieces.

They catch each other’s gaze and the man gives Lance a subtle nod, eyes shifting implicatively toward Keith before darting back to Lance’s blue ones. He could swear that he’s looking at a_ smirk _. “And invite your friend next time, Keith. I’d love to get to know him better. I fear I may have come off as rude.”

There's something about the way he says it, even though his expression doesn't give away a damn thing, Lance can just tell this guy is_ teasing_ Keith. 

And it helps that Keith's reaction isn't nearly as controlled and impassive, his face lighting up in a blush that's practically neon. 

Huh... maybe Lance had this all wrong, maybe him and hot British guy are on the same side here, both rooting for the same team. Maybe he isn't a rival after all.

After that, Keith is very quick to urge the man to leave, the time of begging him to stay long gone. He practically shoves him out of the locker room, muttering quietly under his breath to the point that Lance can't even make out what they're saying. He figures he might have an idea though, and the thought has him grinning like a damn idiot even after he's left alone in the locker room. Is it possible that Keith's mentioned him before? Hm?

He follows after them a few seconds later, when his patience wanes and he can't bear not to any longer.

Lance steps into the room just in time to watch the stranger leave. He can't tear his eyes away, his mind working overtime. He's not even checking him out really, just admiring the graceful way he seems to float through the room. He’s so… posh. Lance has never met anyone like him in his life and it’s the last kind of person he would have expected Keith to be friends with. Clearly, he knows even less about Keith than he thought.

“Who was that guy?” Lance asks dumbly, approaching Keith where he's standing in the middle of the gym floor. Keith startles a little bit at the sound of his voice, but quickly relaxes when he turns to look at Lance. He shrugs his shoulders, completely casual about it. Lance watches him closely for even the slightest hint of agitation, any sign that maybe this is a topic that should be awkward for them, that maybe there's tension there that they should avoid breaching... but there's nothing. Keith seems genuinely at ease, even uncharacteristically_ warm_.

“An old friend. We don’t see each other much anymore, but we used to be really close.” 

“He seems nice.” Lance observes impassively, begging Keith to give him more to work with without having to come out and ask for it. Keith moves around the gym, starts rolling up yoga mats while Lance follows him like a little lost puppy. He can't help it. He's always been curious by nature. But especially now. He's never seen or heard Keith talk about anyone in his private life, this feels like something pivotal. A key to understanding Keith better.

“He can be." Keith answers eventually, getting to his feet and brushing his hands off on his pants. "He comes across as a bit of a douche at first, so don't worry if he gave you that impression. I hated him when we first met, thought he was a pompous asshole. He grows on you though, and he has his reasons for being standoffish. Besides, I'm hardly the poster child for making good first impressions. I guess we sort-of bonded over our social ineptitude, weirdly enough."

“Huh.” Lance breathes out, leaning back against one of the treadmills and tilting his head back to think on it. Keith sounds fond, yeah, but with an obvious undertone of exasperation. More like Lance talks about his brother than an ex lover. So maybe it isn’t romantic at all?

“Did you need me for something?”

“Oh. I nearly forgot!” Lance exclaims, digging his phone out of his pocket. If he’d forgotten about why he was here, then he’d definitely forgotten why he was supposed to be rushing. He’s very late to the party at this point, but he has to show Keith now that he’s here. He opens up Instagram and then the gym’s account messages, shoving the phone toward Keith. “I’m here to talk about a business opportunity.”

“For the last time, I don’t need any shirtless hot guys to stand outside my gym and lure people in.”

“I mentioned that _ one time _! As a joke!” Lance hisses, grabbing Keith’s hand (it’s so big it dwarfs his in a warm embrace, Lance really doesn’t wanna let go) and shoving the phone right into his palm. Keith begrudgingly lifts it up and starts to scan the messages. 

Lance is brimming with excitement as Keith reads, can hardly contain himself from blabbering on and explaining what the text on screen is already saying. “We’ve got out first potential sponsor! They wanna pay us to use their work-out machines and review them publicly. They’re gonna send you one free of charge. Totally free, Keith!”

“You’re kidding.” Keith breathes, a wide smile invading his face, so achingly genuine that it hurts. Lance has never felt pride quite like this, at getting Keith to smile so unabashedly. _ Ooh _, look at those dimples!

“I did a little bit of digging and they seem like the real deal, they’re just new to the business and need help advertising. Thanks to my excellent photography and marketing skills, our page is picking up quite a lot of traffic. Even with people that aren’t from around here and just want to admire from afar.”

“Yeah, I mean, if you can arrange something I’m down to try it.”

“Awesome.” Lance grins as he takes the phone back and starts typing up a formal response. Keith just stares at him for a long moment, pride swelling in his eyes, before turning back to his work. When Lance eventually finishes and looks up, Keith has grabbed a broom and is meticulously sweeping the entire gym. He looks sort-of adorably out of place, ripped muscular guy handling a dainty little plastic broom with care. 

Lance can’t help but smile as he walks over and settles a hand on his lower back, his touch fleeting as it quickly drifts away on his walk toward the door. “Okay, that’s really all I needed to know, so I’ll get out of your hair now.”

“No rush. I was just packing up anyway. Company might be nice.” Keith calls after him. It’s not really urgent, nothing Keith does ever gives that impression, but the fact he said it at all means something substantial. Lance catches himself smirking and has to wipe the expression from his face completely before he turns back around, lest Keith think he’s being teased for being needy.

“Yeah?” Lance says with an even voice, somehow managing to conceal how overjoyed he is that Keith is actively _asking_ for his company. He rolls an exercise ball over because that’s the only form of seating Keith has in this goddamn place, makes himself comfortable while Keith works around him. He’s never been great with exercise balls, the whole sitting still thing is not his forte, but he manages to only roll around and fall off once while Keith is sweeping. “Busy day?”

“Business is booming. As much as I want to believe it’s a sudden influx of people committed to getting healthy and fit, I think it has more to do with the questionable photos you keep posting of me.”

“Oh? So you’re addressing that all your patrons wanna fuck you now?” Lance grins wolfishly, relishes the exasperated glare Keith shoots his way. It’s a common game of back and forth at this point, Keith never takes well to blatant reminders about how attractive he is. But he secretly loves it, Lance knows that he does, even if the body language says otherwise. Keith has never told him to stop and Keith is a pretty straightforward kinda guy. “Also, they’re not questionable, they’re literally just photos of you at work, doing your job. It’s not my fault if they all look sexual, that’s just how you naturally look. Untamed raw sex appeal, remember?”

“How could I forget?” Keith mutters under his breath.

“No one’s being creepy about it, are they?” Lance asks suddenly, a jolt of sudden concern washing over him. Just because Keith doesn’t mind Lance calling him attractive and drawing attention to it doesn’t mean he’s okay with everyone else sexualizing him like that. “‘Cause like, I know you can fight your own battles, I’m a twig in comparison to you, but if you ever need me to say something to one of th-”

“What makes you think you’re so different from all the other creepy guys, huh?” Keith jabs back at him, folding his hands atop the broom handle and resting his chin on them, his gaze completely glued to Lance. It's more than a little bit overwhelming, but Lance does his best to meet it, to look into those deep considering eyes.

“I mean, you don’t invite them inside after closing time, do you?” Lance asks, bouncing back and forth on the exercise ball between his legs, a shit-eating grin stretching across his face. Keith just gives him this look, total annoyance and adoration wrapped up in one. Lance decides to push his luck a little further, to attempt to weasel his way into some answers when Keith is obviously in a good mood. “Well, aside from that guy that was here when I arrived…”

“Am I sensing some_ jealousy_ from Lancey Lance? Worried your title of favorite client is at risk?” Keith replies, with that level of bluntness than never ceases to be a little bit jarring. Lance isn't used to being called out on his bullshit so outright, usually people at least attempt to be subtle back at him. Whatever, he can roll with it, if it means he'll get the answers he wants. 

“Aw, _ Keith _ , you never told me I was your favorite!” Lance squeals exaggeratedly, fluttering his eyelashes and framing his face with his hands. Keith gives him a quiet huff of begrudged acknowledgement, but then he’s turning to head back to the supplies closet and Lance panics. He doesn’t want the topic to be over just yet. They're nowhere near where he needs them to be. He needs it spelled out for him, in plain terms, a black or white answer. Yes or no. Does he have a chance or not?

But Keith is walking away and Lance is panicking and...

Before he can talk any sense into himself, he blurts what he _ really _wants to ask. “So, is he like an ex of yours?”

A long beat of silence follows the question. More than long enough for Lance to regret asking, to start brainstorming ways to take it back.

“You’re ridiculous.” Keith says eventually, turning around to face him. He gives him a look, eyebrows raised expectantly, and Lance immediately wants to apologize for even asking. It’s not his place, he knows it isn’t. He just desperately wants to know. It'll keep him up at night if he doesn't get any answers. He'll second guess everything they have going together, if he thinks Keith might not be single. He'll find a way to convince himself that Keith isn't really flirting back out of genuine interest, is just pitying him or incapable of rejecting him or-

And, thank the heavens, he doesn’t have to ask again because Keith supplies it all on his own. He settles on the floor a few feet away from Lance, folds his knees underneath himself and gets comfortable. There's a hint of tension there now, but it's customary for any time Keith is forced to share something about himself. He always looks like this, like every word is being torn out of his throat. “It’s nothing like that. He really is just a friend. We went through a lot together a few years ago, the guy’s like a brother to me even if I’m not involved in the same circles anymore. He’s not in town much so we try to get together whenever we can to catch up.”

There they are. All of the answers Lance was searching for. And yet the weight doesn't lift from his chest, the relief never comes.

Keith looks so... distraught. More outwardly emotional than Lance has ever had the pleasure of seeing him, for better or for worse. 

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to hit a nerve.” Lance tells him gently, kicking his foot out to gently brush it against Keith’s knee. It's an offering of a truce, an out in case Keith needs one and wants to drop the subject altogether. Keith hums thoughtfully, shoves his foot away and leans back against the palms of his hands for support.

“You didn’t.” Keith deadpans, not offering much in terms of an explanation. Lance’s expression must plainly state that the two word response leaves much to be desired, because Keith is awkwardly continuing even as he visibly struggles to find the right words. “It’s_ fine_. Things are just a little tense between us right now. I’m worried about him and he keeps brushing me off.”

“Wanna… talk about it?” Lance ventures carefully, not wanting to spook him. Keith grimaces just the same though, curling in on himself slightly. He looks off-put by the idea, like he can’t even fathom why he’d talk to Lance about his emotions. Maybe they haven’t made nearly as much progress as Lance thought, or maybe this is the way things will always be with Keith, held at an arm’s distance. He hopes not, but he can't help but expect the worst when they've made so little progress after months of knowing each other.

“Thanks, but no. It’s pretty complicated and I don’t want to put that weight on your shoulders.”

“You’re really not gonna share a single thing about yourself until I pry it out of you, huh?” Lance says it mostly to himself. He really doesn’t want to put any expectations onto Keith, especially if he isn’t comfortable sharing. That’s the last thing he wants. He just feels… dejected. He wishes Keith trusted him enough to be a part of his life in more intimate ways than just business partners. “Pretty sure you can name all my siblings off by heart at this point and I don’t even know if you_ have _any.”

“One. A brother.” Keith says finally, in one quiet exhale. It looks like he’s struggling to say even that much though and Lance can’t help but feel guilty for pressuring him into it. He doesn’t want that, he doesn’t want the information, not really, not as much as he just wants Keith to trust him enough to give it. “He’s not biological. I don’t… I don’t have any biological family. I was an orphan.”

“Oh.” Lance goes completely still where he’d been bouncing on the exercise ball for almost twenty minutes. He flounders slightly, at a total loss for how to approach the situation. Suddenly, another piece of the puzzle slots into place. Things are starting to make a little more sense. “Shit, Keith, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t go sticking my nose where it doesn’t belong, I just-”

“Wanna get to know me. I know.” Keith cuts him off, but his tone is gentle. He understands, he knows that Lance is lost as to how to respond to that. Keith has probably had to struggle his way through explaining his history hundreds of times before, to people that overreacted or underreacted, to people that said hurtful things without realizing. He doubts it’s an easy subject to breach for the first time and Lance still can’t help but feel like he pressured him too much. “I wanna get to know you too. You think I’d listen to all of your rants about your family as closely as I do if that wasn’t the case?”

Lance smiles, but it's bittersweet. A compliment laced with something equally hurtful. 

“So… you wanna know me, but you don’t want me to know _you_?”

“There isn’t much to know.” Keith says gently. “The more questions you ask the more answers like that one you’re gonna get. I don’t have fun stories or memories to recount, I don’t really have hobbies because all I’ve ever done is work. Besides, my past is in the past for a reason. I don’t want to revisit it.”

“I won’t make you.” Lance tells him hurriedly, desperate to reassure. But Keith still looks indescribably uncomfortable, like Lance has brought things to the forefront of his mind that are normally kept locked away in the shadows. He wishes he knew how to fix it, to get Keith back to his usual self, detached and unreachable, a little bit cocky.

“I’m sorta trying to reinvent myself, with the gym and everything. I don’t really… know who I am right now. So how am I supposed to tell_ you _?”

It makes a lot more sense all of the sudden, the lack of sense everything has made up until this point. Keith doesn't have anything to share besides what Lance already knows, because what you see really is what you get. Keith has turned his back on his past and only has the future to look to. And as much as it pains Lance that he might never get to know who Keith used to be, isn't it a privilege in itself that he knows this new stage of Keith's life? That he gets to be right there beside him as he embarks on it? He's been here since the gym really started to pick up traffic, has helped Keith along the way as much as he can.

He knows Keith. He knows all that matters, anyway. That's enough. This is enough for him.

“Well, let me help you out and fill you in on what I’ve learned so far.” Lance suggests warmly, taking another step closer and wrapping his arms tightly around Keith’s middle. Keith reacts to the hug much like a cat would, squirming and shifting around like he’s simply a being never meant to be contained in any way shape or form. But when Lance lets his grip go slack, slack enough that Keith could easily pull away, the other boy stays.

Keith is the _ opposite _of relaxed, he’s tense and rigid as a board, body unmoving and unforgiving against Lance’s chest where it’s tucked in so close. But he doesn’t try to pull away, so Lance takes that as the closest thing to approval he may very well get. So he continues, chin tucked over Keith’s shoulder because he’s pretty sure distant and detached Keith Kogane would have a heart attack if he was forced to look Lance in the eye while he said nice things about him. 

“First of all, you’re kind, almost to a fault when you let customers walk all over you and you give way more than you’re getting paid to.”

“I don’t-”

“You’re smart. A fucking genius in your own right. I can’t imagine all the paperwork and math and shit that goes into keeping this place running. Not to mention you’re too cheap to hire repair people so you figure out how to fix any machine that breaks all on your own, like some kinda tech whiz. You’re the most hardworking and resourceful person I know.” Lance takes a breather, feels Keith relax ever so slightly against him. 

“You don’t need to say all this, I’m not… some insecure kid looking for reassurance.” Keith doesn’t have to say it. Lance hears the unspoken “_ not anymore _” loud and clear. He wishes he could have been there to provide reassurance when Keith did need it, before he found a way to make do and look inwardly for it. It must have been a lonely road to get to this point. But Lance is here now, and he has to keep reminding himself of that, to not take for granted what he's been given here. It's enough to be a part of the next chapter of Keith's story.

“I want to.” Lance insists, because it’s the genuine truth. He loves talking about Keith, he’s chatted everyone else’s ears off talking about him. If anything, it’s even better to finally talk about Keith_ to _Keith and to cherish his reactions. “You love bad jokes and terrible flirting. You pretend you’re above it, but it’s the easiest and only guaranteed way to get you to laugh. And your laugh is so adorable, it’s worth every joke that doesn’t land or goes right over your head.”

“Ever think that maybe I really hate the terrible flirting and I just like_ you _?” Keith's voice is barely above a whisper, just on the edge of audible even with how closely they're pressed together. He doesn't sound uncertain though, not in the slightest.

It’s Lance’s turn to tense into the hug, not even daring to breathe in case it ruins the moment.

“I _ have _thought about it, but I always managed to convince myself it was wishful thinking.”

“Well, maybe it’s not.” Keith backs up slowly, out of the hug but not far enough that he leaves Lance’s outstretched arms. And then they’re looking at each other and Lance doesn’t even have the sense about him to wipe the shocked dumbstruck expression off his face. He just stands there gaping like a fish out of water, blushing the deepest shade of red physically possible. Can anyone blame him though? This is a lot to comprehend considering mere moments ago he thought they were never going to breach any of these topics, and now here they are barreling through them one after the other. It's all new territory.

Keith smiles at him, doesn’t answer any of the thousand questions swimming around in Lance’s head, but somehow that soft expression alone is enough to calm him down. “My apartment’s over the gym.”

“Wow, that’s one more fact to the tally of things I know about Keith, thanks.” Lance blurts stupidly, and Keith looks like he wants to hit him suddenly. In hindsight, almost immediately after speaking Lance realizes where he went wrong, but then he’s shocked into silence by the actual realization of why Keith brought it up.

Surely that wasn’t… an _ invitation _?

“No, you idiot, I’m asking you if you wanna come upstairs.” Keith clarifies. “To my apartment. With me.”

It’s happening. Oh god, it’s finally happening. Lance has prepared meticulously for this moment and yet, he doesn’t have a single idea on how to respond right now.

He doesn’t wanna come on too strong, make Keith think he has any sort-of expectations for what’s going to happen. But he also doesn’t wanna seem too aloof, like he isn’t interested at all in anything more than a platonic hang-out sesh. Because he is very, very, very interested. He’s supremely interested. He’s-

They both startle at the sound of Lance’s phone ringing. He quickly digs it out and hangs up on whoever is calling him, decides it can definitely wait until later. But only after he’s hung up does he notice the name on the screen and remember where he’s supposed to be right now.

Shit.

“I want to. I really do. God, I would _ love _ to, but…” Lance flinches as he reluctantly trails off, wishing with all his might that he hadn’t promised to go to this stupid baby shower. Sure, he loves kids. Sure, he loves those party games where he has to pin safety pin diapers to his shirt whenever someone in the room crosses their legs. But damn it, being the office’s certified little brother figure has never been so directly inconvenient to him. “My favorite coworker is having this baby shower and I haven’t seen her in _ weeks _because she’s off on maternity leave, and I only planned on stopping by for a couple minutes to let you know about the deal, so I really-”

“It’s fine, Lance.” Keith chuckles, shaking his head fondly. He takes a step back, puts a few feet between them. Lance immediately misses the closeness, wonders when he’ll get another chance to have it. He hopes this isn’t a first and a last for them, that Keith doesn’t take this rejection as something more permanent than it is.

“Another time. We’ll get takeout and make a night of it.” Lance promises him, clapping him on the shoulder good-naturedly. Keith leans into the touch, then just as quickly pulls away and starts heading toward the front doors. Lance follows closely behind him, grins slightly when Keith automatically grabs his jacket off the rack and hands it to him.

“I’ll see you Monday? For training?” Keith asks, watching him scramble to get ready. Lance nods eagerly, looking up at him through his lashes. Keith is leaning against the wall, arms crossed over his stomach, hair down and falling in his face, and he just looks so… warm. Like Lance could forgo the jacket entirely and just trudge out into the autumn weather with only Keith’s affection to block out the cold.

Lance feels tempted to kiss him. To take that final step between them and demolish it, to close the space that's been between them for so long and claim it as his own. He’s pretty sure it would be a positive reaction at this point, they aren’t exactly playing the subtle game anymore. Still… now isn’t the right time.

When Lance kisses Keith, he wants their schedules to be clear indefinitely afterward, because he isn’t sure he’ll be able to stop once he starts.

So, instead he reaches down between them to grab Keith’s hand and give it a soft squeeze.

Their gazes meet and linger. 

Lance smiles softly, holds his hand just a little bit tighter before pulling away.

“Wouldn’t miss it for the world.”

\--

Except he _ does _miss it. 

Because the next day… he decides to go to Whole Foods for some lazy Sunday grocery shopping, which leads him to the frozen food section. And I think we all know what happens there. _Clean up on aisle four, Lancey-Lance just got his throat ripped out to the soulful melodies of What's New Pussycat._

He doesn’t show up at 8am on Monday because he’s a_ little bit _ busy being dead in a dumpster somewhere.

\--

At about 8_pm_ on Monday, however, he wakes up in said dumpster.

Still dead.

But... _awake_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I took so many creative liberties with this fic? The plague of my existence since I started writing has been flashbacks, don't know why, that's just how it is. And I really wanted this fic to start with the scene where Lance gets turned because it was the first thing I wrote and it just seemed so ?? Catchy. I don't know. It was just where the story needed to start, but I also wanted to be able to show his relationship with Keith in-depth before the vampirism. I like how it turned out so I hope it reads as smoothly as I'm thinking it does????
> 
> Feel free to follow me on my social medias listed below! I might be doing a few polls about the direction this story is gonna take, kinda like a choose your own adventure type accompaniment to the story. I've done one so far and it's still open as of the time I'm posting this, so head on over to my nsfw acc if you wanna vote on that.
> 
> nsfw twitter acc: @redgaysonly  
main twitter/tumblr accs: @melancholymango
> 
> ps: ive never been to a Whole Foods in my life bc we don't have them in canada as far as i know???? please don't question me on my whole foods lore, i am trying my best


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Helllloooo, my darling loyal monsterfuckers. I have returned from the void. 
> 
> PLEASE READ THE TAGS!!! I have updated them. THis chapter gets way bloodier and hornier than ever before and ever intended. I don't wanna make anyone uncomfy with my big fat vampire kink.

Instead of dying and staying dead, you know, like all living things are  _ supposed  _ to… Lance wakes up in a dumpster covered in his own blood, with a shriveled up decaying rat carcass next to his face.

Which, really, is the worst way to start into the afterlife. For a terrifying moment he even has to wonder if this is  _ Hell _ , if eternal damnation for him is being exposed to the filthy conditions of the inside of a dumpster and never being able to shower it off. He figured he was headed down under anyway, he’s looked up some really questionable porn in his lifetime, and fair is fair.

But no, when he brings his legs up and kicks hard against the lid of the dumpster, it flies open without any resistance at all. It’s dark outside, but Lance finds that even in the unlit alleyway he can make out all the shapes and figures of the trash piled around. It’s weird actually, how well he can see in the darkness. 

Even in the pitch black depths of the dumpster he’d been able to see that rat as clear as day.

Understandably, he’s a little bit too wound up to fully register what that might mean, so he doesn’t think too hard about it. His cellphone and his wallet are still buried into his back pocket (which is just sloppy murdering, if you ask him). He’s relieved to have some petty cash on him though, as he wanders out of the alley and finds himself in what might be the sketchiest part of the city he’s ever seen.

It takes him an hour of wandering along the roads to find a cab, and then another twenty minutes to convince the man to let him into the car when he’s covered in blood. He ends up having to pay double the normal fare, but money is the last thing on his mind right now.

The drive is a tense one. He spends it with his face pressed to the window, staring at the shapes of houses whirring past. The radio is a quiet static in the background and it does nothing to distract him from his worried thoughts. The driver doesn’t offer any conversation either, doesn’t judge Lance one way or the other for being soaked with blood. It’s almost like he sees it as a regular occurence, doesn’t care much as long as his upholstery doesn’t end up stained.

Lance is… scared. He’s terrified, to be more specific. He hasn’t looked at the injuries on his neck, he’s not sure he can stomach it if he does, but the most bizarre part of all of this is that they don’t hurt. Those two massive bite marks on either side of his throat don’t even  _ hurt _ . 

He wonders if the man drugged him somehow, if it’ll have lasting effects on his body. And god, he hasn’t even really started to _ think  _ about the diseases he could have caught… both from the stranger biting him _ and _ the dumpster.

He really can’t deny that he feels off in more ways than one and that it’s only getting worse the more time that passes since he awoke. 

His head hurts with how sensitive his hearing seems to be, the low drag of the radio enough to send him into a splitting migraine. His eyes feel overtired and dry despite the fact he’s been asleep for hours, as they scan the dark streets with surprising attention to detail. Hell, weirdly enough, even his mouth feels wrong, like he can break down and identify every flavor on his tongue. And none of them are the right one. 

He’s not sure what it is he wants, but he’s got a craving unlike any other. He wonders if this is what his sister-in-law felt like when she was pregnant with his nephew and craved peanut butter and pickles together. How did she even stumble across that combination and know it was the _ right  _ one? 

Lance doesn’t care at this point, he’d eat anything to satisfy the strange crawling sensation of need in the back of his throat. He feels like a man starved and sure he hasn’t eaten in a whopping twenty-four hours, but this feels a little intense even for that. Something is very wrong in the way his stomach growls and curls, in the way his gums feel swollen whenever he runs his tongue over them. There’s a ferality to it that scares him, like he’d do  _ anything  _ to eat.

He’s definitely been drugged. That has to be it. He’s never felt quite this unhinged before in his entire life, like he’s a stranger in his own body. He hates it. He wants control back.

When the cab pulls up in front of the local hospital, Lance nearly sobs with relief.

“Thank-you. It really means a lot to me that you gave me a lift, even though I’m covered in-”

“Yeah, yeah. It’s all in a day’s work, I’m a modern-day hero. Your fare’s thirty-six bucks, and you told me you were gonna double that, so…”

“Right.” Lance digs his wallet out and hands over the closest thing to the correct change he has, gives the man a courteous nod as he slips out into the parking lot. The taxi speeds off the moment his feet touch the ground, he hardly even has time to shut the door behind himself. 

And it’s not like was expecting to find a lot of comfort in the cabbie that’s seen some shit, but damn, a little bit of concern for his well-being would have been nice. For all he knows, he’s about to walk through those hospital doors and get a death sentence.

\--

He  _ does _ get a death sentence, just not in the way he understands.

\--

Lance feels indescribably small, sat on the edge of the hospital bed and waiting for the nurse to come in and see him. The paper sheet laid out underneath him is crinkly and keeps scrunching up around his thighs, and every single noise it makes feels like a stabbing pain driven into his skull. He can’t remember ever feeling like this in his life, it’s more intense than a migraine at this point, it’s overwhelming to the extent that he can hardly think around it. It feels like his entire body is possessed by something outside of his control.

He’s practically in a daze, losing track of the seconds and minutes that pass by, until suddenly there’s a doctor walking into the room. And suddenly all of his attention is on her, eyes darting upright to drink her presence in, to saturate in the sight of her. He can’t explain it, but he feels compelled to get to his feet, to rush to her side and greet her. He fights the strange urge though, keeps himself firmly seated on the edge of the hospital bed and silently prays that she’ll know what to do to help him.

He doesn’t want to feel like this anymore. Everything just feels wrong. He’s not _ himself _ .

“Lance McClain?” The doctor addresses him by name, looking up from her clipboard. He gingerly pries his hands from the mattress, wincing slightly when he sees he’d managed to rip through the paper and mattress alike, ten imprints into the foam staring back at him. What the hell… he knows that he’d been distracted, been desperately grasping for something to anchor himself, but surely he would have noticed ripping apart the fucking mattress like that.

To her credit, the doctor doesn’t even flinch at the destruction he’s caused, her focus is entirely on him.

“Yeah, that’s me.” Lance answers quietly, feeling far away from the moment. He’s already pinched his own arm more than once, clinging to the idea that this whole thing might just be one overly elaborate nightmare, brewed up from late nights and coffee before bed. God, what he’d give for it to be a dream.

“How are we feeling? You’ve had a really rough day, haven’t you?” The doctor asks kindly, pulling her chair over in front of him and settling into it. She stares up at him, eyes bright and curious. He notes her name tag, licks his chapped lips and tries to actually process the information. “It says here on your file that you were attacked? Bitten? By another person?”

“Yeah.” Lance nods, cringing slightly at the memory. That still feels real, even if nothing else does. The pain and the panic from that moment still clung to him like a weight on his shoulders. That was the last time he could remember that anything felt  _ real _ , that this fuzziness wasn’t clinging to the edges of his vision, making it impossible to concentrate on anything other than that traitorous  _ craving  _ eating away at him… it’s a feeling he’s never experienced before and it frightens him how intense it is.

“Alright, well, let’s see the injuries and go from there.” The doctor got to her feet, pulling on a pair of plastic gloves. Lance watches dismally, slowly retreating into his own head again while she moves around the small room. His gaze follows her, never once wavers. It’s odd, but he could swear that he can smell her from here. Not in the sense that she smells unpleasant like sweat, or even pleasant like perfume, it’s different than that. It’s just an innately human sort-of smell. 

She turns back to him suddenly and he wrenches his gaze away, shame eating away at him despite the fact he hadn’t even been doing anything wrong. He wasn’t looking at her sexually, but something still feels like a boundary crossed. He’d done something wrong, even if he can’t determine what. 

Soon, she’s standing over him with a smile plastered to her face. Encouraging. “Would you like to show me the injuries and let me take a look?”

“You can’t see them already?” Lance asks in bewilderment, even adding in a little skeptical scoff for good measure. She just stares blankly back at him, like she doesn’t understand the joke. He tilts his head pointedly to the side and gestures to his neck, waits for the pain of the stretch against fresh wounds but it never comes. It still doesn’t hurt. He still can’t feel it. He can’t really feel anything beyond the desire chipping away at his self-control, piece by piece, whispering horrible urges into his head that he can hardly begin to decipher. “They’re right here, on my neck.”

She steps closer still, their legs brushing as she grips Lance’s jaw and turns his head gently further to the side for a better view. Lance feels something in him come alive at the simple touch, the haze that’s been settled over him since waking up in that dumpster finally beginning to clear, because he’s found it. This is the thing his body has been craving, or at least as close to it as he’s gotten. The barest hint of relief finds him, as her hands slide over his skin.

He concentrates on where she’s touching him, on the heat of her fingertips leaching into his own skin even through the gloves she wears. She’s warm. So warm it almost hurts. It’s scalding, like pressing his hand to a stove burner, but he doesn’t feel the pain as much as the rush of adrenaline. He wants to covet that feeling, wants desperately to bathe himself in her warmth. He hadn’t realized before this moment, but he’s cold, so very cold.  _ Freezing _ .

“I’m not seeing anything that warrants this much blood loss, but let me clean up the area and get a better look at it.” The woman mumbles, almost entirely to herself. But Lance is listening now, fully invested in the moment, hyper-aware of everything happening around him. And oh, the moment she says it, his mind runs absolutely wild with the possibilities. Blood. He’d almost forgotten how covered he was in the stuff, but now that it’s back to the forefront of his mind it’s all he can think about. 

But not his own, no, he couldn’t care less about the state he’s in. He thinks about blood and it’s not cold and tacky, dried into his clothing, with haunting memories to accompany it. It’s fresh and thick, a bright rich red color, and oh so warm. _ Burning _ . 

Thoughts race through his mind now, a contrast to the daze from before. They’re horrible thoughts, ones he wished he could banish as soon as they come. They’re gory and violent, nothing like anything he’s ever thought before. They can’t be his own, they have to be a side-effect of the bad drug trip he’s having because he would never want to… hurt someone. 

It scares him deep down to his core, how unlike himself it is, and how little control he feels like he has over himself in this strange state. But on the surface, in the here and now, it brings about a sense of sick satisfaction that has him feeling  _ giddy _ . He doesn’t know how or why, but he feels compelled to kill her, to tear into her with his teeth like a fucking animal.

Lance feels tears threaten to build behind his eyes, as he tears himself up inside trying to make sense of why he’s thinking such disgusting things. And it’s not as simple as them just being thoughts, passing and fleeting, just the entertaining of possibility. There’s a definite urge there to _ act  _ on them, even though the deeper part of himself insists that isn’t what he wants, that he’d never want that.

He wants to cry. He wants to go home. He wants to feel like himself again. 

The doctor hums suddenly, pulling back with her eyebrows furrowed together into something puzzled by whatever she’s seeing. She’s holding a bloody rag, and it’s clear now that at one point she’d started to clean the mess from Lance’s neck, but he hadn’t even _ noticed _ . He’d been too distracted. “Lance, I know there wasn’t anything listed on your file, but do you take any kind of medication that I should be aware of? Any history of drug or substance abuse? Please be honest.”

“N-No?” Lance answers, feeling a lump forming in his throat the longer she stares back at him. Her gaze is critical, obviously disbelieving. He doesn’t know what to make of the accusation. Feels a flare of defensiveness rising in his chest at the thought. But he tamps down the aggression as best he can, only sounds a little bit unimpressed when he forces himself to elaborate. “There’s a chance the man might have drugged me. But I’m not imagining the bites, those were real! I swear they were! Things only started to get fuzzy  _ after  _ that!”

“There are no injuries on your neck, Lance.” The doctor replies evenly, void of emotion. Lance winces at the information, reaches up with a hand and starts to carelessly prod at the area. There’s nothing there, his skin is smooth and unmarred, aside from the stickiness of the leftover blood. He does start to cry now, exhausted by trying to comprehend everything happening to him. “There are only a couple of old scars that look like they’ve been healed over for years.”

“Can I see?” Lance asks, because he needs to see it with his own eyes to believe it. She nods and grabs a nearby mirror from a drawer, bringing it back to him. He draws it back, wishes something desperately that the marks will be there when he angles it right, that this is all a misunderstanding and she somehow missed them. But there’s nothing there. It’s exactly as she said, just the faintest discoloration of his skin on either side of his neck, where he remembers searing pain from just a short twelve hours before.

“I’m gonna examine all your vitals and then we’re gonna do a mental wellness check-up, is that okay with you? Maybe a couple blood samples.”

“That sounds good.” Lance answers, equally as professional and void of emotion as she’d been, even as he boils over into something chaotic and unstable inside. She bustles around the room and he implodes on the table. It doesn’t make sense, none of it does. He knows he didn’t imagine it. He isn’t absolutely batshit crazy. Surely it was on the news or something? Right? The grocery store would have reported it, they announced it over the P.A. What the hell.

Lance is broken out of his panicked recollection by a warm hand on his wrist, gently lifting it. All rational thought leaves him in one fell sweep, his entire being honing in on the touch. It’s more than a little bit unsettling, how overwhelming a simple touch to his wrist feels. It’s ethereal. It’s ecstasy. It’s everything he could ever want. 

Almost. 

It’s _ almost _ everything he could ever want, as those nasty thoughts remind him when they return tenfold.

“Huh, that’s funny, I can’t find your pulse anywhere.” The woman gives a slightly unsettled laugh to accompany the observation, but Lance can’t bring himself to think about it too hard. If he could, maybe he’d be starting to piece things together by now.

But as it is, he’s completely drunk on the feeling of her blood pulsing beneath her skin. That’s what it is, what it’s been all along. The warmth he’s been basking in, the disgusting thoughts, the intriguing smell from before, the pulsing thud of his headache in tune with each beat of her pulse… it all comes back to the blood. That’s what it is, isn’t it? What he’s been craving since the moment he woke up.

She lifts his shirt and presses the cool metal of the stethoscope to his chest. He trembles with need, she mistakes it for a shiver at the temperature. 

She shifts closer to get a better reading, eyebrows furrowed and lip jutted out in concentration. He leans in toward her, stops just short of burying his nose into her hair.

She moves to pull away. He moves to follow.

“You smell really… good.” The words tumble past his lips in a growl, animalistic in nature, reverberating from somewhere deep inside his chest. The moment his nose brushes across her hair and he inhales sharply, going cross-eyed with the weight of her scent hitting him in full force… she lands a hand on his chest and shoves him backward. It catches him off guard completely, but even still it’s hardly enough to have him budging. 

It doesn’t matter though because she evades him in the same instant. The wheels of her chair roll quickly across the linoleum. He watches her go with a pout, fighting the urge to spring to his feet and pursue. He doesn’t want to frighten her any further. You catch more flies with honey and she’ll surely be back. She’ll want to come back. He’ll just have to make her  _ want _ to come back.

“Sir, this is a professional environment! Sexual advances are entirely inappropriate! If you can’t get a handle on your behavior, I’m going to have to ask you to leave or have you escorted out. We have law enforcement on the premises.” She’s shouting. Something about her flustered and offended screeching has Lance coming back to himself all at once, eyes blinking wide open and registering what he’d just said, what he’d been attempting to do. Oh god.

What if she hadn’t stopped him in time? Would he really have  _ bitten _ her?!

“I didn’t mean it like that!” Lance shouts hurriedly, scrambling up onto the hospital bed and plastering himself against the far wall. He can’t believe that he just did _ that _ . “I’m not the kinda guy that comes onto girls in the workplace when they’re contractually obligated to be nice to me, I swear. I can behave. I will behave. I’m not interested in that at all. I just want you to help me. Please help me.”

It was the truth. It was the whole truth.

In the same instant it was an entire lie. 

It was like there were two versions of himself fighting for control of his body, with deeply contrasting desires and goals in mind. And there was a dread settling over him that insisted he wasn’t the stronger of the two, that he could only fight for so long before he gave in. He should leave before that happens. He should forget about getting help and run, he should put space between them and-

But he’s so scared. Terrified to his core. He can’t imagine _ staying _ like this. 

He needs help. 

“A-Alright, I’ll help, but one more incident and I won’t hesitate to contact the authorities.”

“It won’t happen again. I am so sorry.” Lance insists, because it’s the truth. The real him is appalled by his actions, mortified by the mere idea that he would ever try to do something like that. He would never attempt to come onto a woman without her full enthusiastic consent, but more than that… to do it with the intention of _ harming  _ her? What the fuck is wrong with him?! 

She goes back to listening for his pulse, growing visibly more upset as the seconds tick by without any results. Lance has a crawling feeling of dread sinking over him slowly, is just beginning to entertain the absolutely ridiculous possibility that’s staring him blaringly in the face. He’s putting the facts together and getting an answer that’s anything but factual in return. There’s no way. No fucking way.

“I’m sorry, I can’t really make sense of this. I don’t… hear a heartbeat?” She pulls the stethoscope from her ears, regarding him with a worried look. But it’s no longer worry for his sake, it's a worry for her own well-being. It’s fear, plain and simple, blatant distrust darkening her eyes the longer she stares at him.

Lance anticipates her next movements before they happen though, when she jolts to her feet with a quick muttered excuse about getting a second opinion. And all he knows is that he absolutely cannot let that happen. He doesn’t want anyone else in on this, he doesn’t want them poking and prodding. He has the feeling that he doesn’t want answers after all, not now that he’s starting to suspect what they might be.

So when she jumps to leave the room, Lance follows in an instant. He barely even feels it as he rises from the table and crosses the room in time to grab her shoulders and wrench her away from the door. She might cry out, but he has a hand over her mouth fast enough that only the barest warbled noise makes it through his fingers. She struggles against him, but gets absolutely nowhere. He barely even feels the resistance against his grip.

The entire situation he finds himself in is horrendous, but worse than the acts themselves is how much he’s enjoying it. There’s something about the pursuit that has his own blood boiling, singing with the need to see it through. He chased, he caught, and now his prey is his to do with what he pleases. 

And it’s sick, he knows it is, knows he isn’t going to hurt her even as every part of his body physically demands that he does. He won’t do it. He can fight it. He _ will  _ fight it at any cost. 

He’ll fight it even though the need is  _ painful _ now, tearing into him from the inside out and gutting him raw. He feels empty, will stay that way until he has scorching hot blood gushing down his throat, straight from the source. The thought of it is enough to have him moaning quietly. This feeling isn’t all that different from lust, it’s the same longing and the same satisfaction the closer he gets to fulfilling it. 

He tells himself he is fighting it, even as he leans in and buries his face into the curve of the woman’s neck like he’s been dying to this entire time. It’s heaven. Everything about it feels so right that it’s impossible to remind himself of why it’s supposed to be wrong.

He doesn’t bite down into the soft supple flesh there like he feels compelled to, not right away at least, he just mouths across her skin and familiarizes himself with the feeling of blood pulsing against his lips. It feels foreign now, he supposes it’s because his own blood is no longer doing the same.

It shouldn’t really come as a surprise when his fangs sink down through his gums, not when he’s all but put a name to his condition already. It does, though, it shocks him maybe more than anything else has when his two top incisors extend downward and fill his mouth uncomfortably. 

It’s the metaphorical nail in the coffin, in the simplest of terms. Maybe he could come up with an excuse for every other piece of information he’d been piling together toward this ridiculous theory, but there’s no excuse for fangs. There are no drugs that cause _ that _ . 

He’s… dead. 

He’s a vampire.

The simple acknowledgement of it is so overwhelming that it manages to somehow distract him from the sultry scent he’s been drinking in like a man starved. Realization hits him like a truck and he bolts backward, colliding with the nearby counter and sending all kinds of doctor equipment clattering across the ground. He doesn’t care, he plasters himself against the counter even harder, begs himself not to fucking move from that spot again because he’s scared of what he’ll do if he does.

“S-Sorry!” Lance shouts, but it comes out barely decipherable. He has a lisp unlike anything he’s ever heard, attempting to speak around the massive fangs still filling his mouth. It doesn’t help that his gums fucking hurt, they ache like the worst toothache he’s ever experienced and a part of him knows it won’t go away unless he fills his mouth with the soothing heat of the blood in this woman’s veins. 

She looks rightfully horrified, like she’s seconds away from screaming her lungs off and begging for someone to save her. She looks like Lance must have earlier that morning in the supermarket, when teeth first sunk into his neck. When he admitted he was going to die there. And then he did.

But now Lance is the one standing here harassing innocent people, he’s the bad guy out to cause mayhem and ruin people’s lives. He’s a monster.

“I’m gonna be sick.” Lance slurs, doubling over right there and spilling his guts into the sink. Except, given that he hasn’t eaten in over a day now, he doesn’t expect his guts to have all that much to share. So you can imagine his shock when liquid _ pours  _ out of him, past his lips and out his nose in the most disgusting of ways. And when he blinks down at the stainless steel he’s desecrating in the crudest of ways… the only thing staring back at him is red. Puddles and puddles of red. 

“Is that… blood?” The doctor asks impishly from behind his shoulder, having crept close enough to observe out of sick curiosity or something of the like. She could be escaping right now, probably should be, but truth be told Lance is unmistakably grateful that he has someone here with him right now. This is the scariest thing that’s ever happened to him. He really doesn’t want to be alone with it.

“Oh no. No, no, no. Fuck no.” Lance breathes out, reaching up to run his hands through his hair and tug at it. He’s definitely crying now, tears rolling down his cheeks on either side. “This can’t be happening.”

Because it really can’t, right? There’s no way he’s a vampire. There’s no way he has fangs filling his mouth right now, big enough to distend his upper lip. There’s no fucking way he drank this much blood at some point and doesn’t remember it. God, this has to be a whole human worth of blood… okay, maybe not, maybe he’s exaggerating. But it doesn’t matter how much it is, even a mouthful would be concerning to him considering _ he doesn’t know whose fucking blood it is _ .

Did he… did he  _ kill  _ someone?

Did he murder someone and then not even give them the respect of remembering the act?

What kind of sick fuck is he? What exactly is he capable of right now? Is  _ anyone _ safe around him?

“I’ll be right back with another doctor, just give me a moment to-” The woman whips around and runs for the door, no doubt ready to call every back-up she has into the room to apprehend the crazy man in here that’s more than likely a murderer. Lance hates it. He knows he should probably let it happen, let her turn him in. But he can’t bring himself to.

“Stop! Don’t move!” Lance yells after her, turning to follow after her as fast as he possibly can. There’s no need to, though, as he quickly finds out. She isn’t running anymore, she’s stopped in the middle of the room just standing there. She’s staring back at him with wide, impressionable eyes. As if she’s waiting on another command to follow.

Lance thinks back to this morning in the supermarket, to the vampire that’d attacked him and turned him into one of its own. He wades through the trauma and the panic of it, gets down to the nitty gritty details and begrudgingly realizes what’s happening. He remembers the vampire commanding him to submit, to  _ want _ it, and how helpless he’d been to do anything but obey the orders.

Despite having no idea how his vampire powers work, or even what they are, it seems he’s exacting that same response. She’s eagerly obeying his every whim right now.

He’s fucking brainwashed her.

He hates himself so furiously that it makes him sick again, and he doubles back over the sink and stays there for a long moment. She never once moves from the spot where she’d frozen before. She just stands by until he’s composed himself and wiped his face clean enough to turn back to her. He weighs his options, tries not to think too hard on it just yet because he’s sure he’d only be sick again if he did.

He knows what he has to do. As much as he doesn’t want to. If he’s going to let himself walk out of here then he has to cover his tracks well. He has to make sure she has no recollection of any of this.

“You’re going to write down in that notebook of yours that everything checked out. My heartbeat was normal, my blood pressure was normal, my mental state was stable. Say that there were bitemarks, but no infection, and you bandaged me and sent me on my way. Easy in, easy out. No complications.”

“No complications.” She repeats, zombie-like. It gives Lance the creeps, as he turns the tap on and rinses all the blood down the drain. He watches it swirl and spiral, disgust crawling over his skin. He doesn’t deserve to get away, not after whatever he’d done. He should be punished, should be apprehended, should be behind bars where he won’t hurt anyone ever again.

But he doesn’t want to  _ die _ . He doesn’t want to throw his life away either. Things were just… they were finally starting to get good. Things were finally working in his favor, and now he’s being asked to give all of that up? And for what? Because some jackass decided for him that his life was expendable?

“And that’s exactly how you’ll remember it, too. Forget everything else that happened here.” Lance finishes, stepping closer to look her in the eye. She stares unblinkingly back into his gaze, nodding her head almost robotically. It isn’t right. Nothing about this is right.

“Of course.”

The moment he’s certain that she’s really going to listen to every word he said, Lance takes off. 

He rushes down the hall and into the elevator, ignoring the very distant smell of fresh blood from a few floors above. The craving is still ebbing away at him, especially when a pile of people shuffle into the elevator with him and he’s forced to smell it, to all but taste the blood in their veins. He makes his escape the second the doors open, uncaring of who he has to push aside to get himself out.

The cool night air feels like a blessing when he finally gets outside, away from all the chatter and the lively smell of so many humans crammed into one building together. Outside it’s easier to ignore the way his body protests his every step, the way all of his senses are trained onto one line of thought. 

He  _ will  _ fight it.

He has to.

\--

Lance doesn’t sleep at all that night. 

To be fair, he isn’t exactly sure that he  _ can  _ sleep anymore, but he certainly feels like ass just the same as always when the sun starts to filter through the blinds into his bedroom. 

Perhaps that has more to do with his lack of… sustenance, though.

A part of him is still clinging onto the hope that it’s all some sort of crazy realistic nightmare. It’s easier to pretend it is when he’s curled up in his bed, blankets draped over his body everywhere but his eyes. His eyes are wide and unblinking, as he stares at his own bedroom like the place is foreign to him. It feels wrong, to be in a place so familiar and calming, but feel like a completely different person.

He’s not sure how long after sunrise he stays like that. He’s sort-of partial to the idea of staying there forever, until he wakes up from the nightmare and reality brings with it a sweeping sense of reassurance. But reality never comes to save him, and instead it’s the chime of his phone going off across the room that has him slowly blinking his eyes back into focus.

He still feels… weird. Hungry, he supposes, might be the term for it. It’s a different kind of hunger than anything he’s ever experienced, but maybe this is how everyone feels on the brink of starvation. He’s sure he must be, there’s no way it should be this damn painful if he isn’t about to die from it. His stomach feels like its taken to eating itself, the cramps are so intense and crippling.

How often do vampires need to feed anyway? Where is he supposed to find credible information on his new condition? Even the man who had turned him into this hadn’t stuck around to give him tips. He was utterly and truly alone with it. He’d never dream of involving anyone he cares about either, not until he’s absolutely sure he isn’t a risk.

And that moment might never come. He might be a risk… always. And then what? Is he meant to leave everyone he cares about behind, for their own good? Never go home to see his family again? Never even be able to explain to them why it is? 

His phone goes off again with another incoming text and it infuriates him for some reason. Maybe because the noise is ear-splitting when he’s so painstakingly in tune with all of his senses, or maybe because it serves as a taunting reminder of what he might have to give up. Either way, anger hits him like an oncoming train, so strongly that he feels his incisors slide down from his gums until the heavy fangs fill his mouth. He unhinges his jaw slightly with a hiss, trying to accomodate for their size without nipping his bottom lip in the process.

Lance brings his hands up ever so slowly, ignores the way they’re trembling with fear. At first, it’s all he can do to bring himself to trace out a single fang with his pointer finger. He follows the long slope of the bone, perfectly smooth to the touch, until he reaches his gums where they’re red and sore. He wonders if that’ll go away with time, or if it’ll always hurt and serve as a painful reminder of his humanity.

Anger blankets him again and in a lapse of judgment, he takes the pad of his thumb and presses it to the point of one of the fangs. He presses with all his might, futilely trying to force the fang back up into his gum, begging for things to go back to normal. All he really manages to do is absolutely massacre his thumb in the process, until blood is dripping down his hand and his wrist, making a mess of his white bedsheets. The fangs don’t budge.

Tears spring from his eyes as he brings his hand back to his mouth, wincing slightly as he lets his tongue lap at the blood. It doesn’t bring him any sense of satisfaction, doesn’t even taste good, if anything it tastes worse than it ever has. But maybe that has to do with the fact that it’s his own, that it isn’t warm enough, that he wasn’t given the thrill of the hunt beforehand. The point is… drinking his own blood is off the table. It physically repulses him to the point he can’t even finish licking himself clean, has to roll out of bed and head for the bathroom in search of tissues instead.

Hand freshly wrapped in toilet paper, Lance turns to head back to his bed. Only to make the mistake of catching a glimpse of himself in the mirror.

The sight is… harrowing, to say the least.

He’s never in his life considered himself to look pale in any stretch of the word, but right now, his skin looks ashy and lifeless. Like a corpse that’s been chilling in the morgue for a few days. His eyes are sunken in and rimmed by dark circles, his hair a complete mess, his neck still smeared with blood. He hardly recognizes himself. Even the eyes staring back at him are a slightly different color, an almost red hue bleeding into the blue of his irises.

Fuck. How is he going to  _ hide _ this? Anyone who knows him will see that something is up. It doesn’t take a genius to decipher when he looks like a zombie extra from an episode of The Walking Dead. 

He decides then and there that he has to do everything in his power to not look like this anymore. He drops his clothes to the bathroom floor and climbs into the shower, turning the heat up to the scorching temperature his body seems to crave more than ever now. He grabs the stupid pink loofah that Hunk had given him for a birthday present and he scrubs his skin raw, drags the meshy plastic over his neck so many times he’s sure it should be actively bleeding again. But it barely even brings him mild discomfort, and he thinks back to how quickly the bitemarks had healed, wonders if superhealing is just another one of the many perks he’s gained by losing his humanity. It still doesn’t feel like a fair trade-off, not to him.

And eventually, once he’s cleaned every disgusting flake of blood from his skin, he wraps himself up in a towel and leans over in front of the mirror. Slowly, with an agonizing amount of attention to detail, he starts to do a full-face of makeup. It’s an odd thing, applying makeup to a face you don’t even want to look at. He visibly winces a couple of times at the start, before he’s got a thick layer of foundation and blush painted on. Soon enough though, he looks mostly like himself again. 

Apart from the eyes.

It’s like they get redder the longer he stares, like the blood he’s scrubbed off his body has simply decided to gather into pools there instead. He’s always loved his eyes, loved how they were the exact same shade of blue as his mother’s, and the same almond shape as his father’s. Now there’s no familiarity there at all, just a dreaded reminder of what he is now.

By then he’s wasted a good hour in the bathroom so he wanders back into his room, wonders what exactly it is he’s meant to do the day after dying. Everything seems inconsequential by comparison, his entire life a joke when he’s aware of a darker reality. It seems stupid to bother with all that makeup and then crawl straight back into bed, but that’s all he feels capable of right now.

Halfway to the bed and his phone goes off again. 

Just a quiet ping as he passes by where it rests on the dresser.

It feels like an instant, but suddenly his phone is in his hand and within the blink of an eye it’s flown across the room to bounce off the opposing wall hard enough to leave a dent behind. Lance flinches in on himself the very moment it hits the ground and he realizes what he’s done. This doesn’t exactly bode well for him believing that he’ll ever have control over himself enough to see his family again, does it?

He crosses the room hesitantly, kneeling on the floor and picking up his poor iphone. The screen is shattered beyond repair, even with the case on it, but it still turns on. His lock screen displays four missed texts and the very moment he reads the name through the cracks in the glass, he wants to throw his phone clear through the third story window and out onto the street below.

Because it’s _ Keith _ .

Of course it’s Keith, who else would be texting him this early on a Monday morning? Everyone knows that Lance isn’t a morning person, that he barely drags himself out of bed in time to make it to work at his 9-5 job most days. The only exception to the rule he has ever made in his entire fucking life… has been to go to the gym to see Keith on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. He’s never once missed an appointment before. 

He could never leave Keith hanging. 

But now he has, and even though it’s absolutely ridiculous, it somehow feels like the worst part of all of this. He cares about Keith so ridiculously much, values him immensely as a friend and as a trainer, knows how much it bothers Keith to sit around and wait for clients to show up. He says it’s because he doesn’t like wasting his time when he should be making money (nevermind that he’s paid in advance), but Lance knows that truthfully it hurts Keith’s feelings at least a little bit when people show up late time and time again, or don’t show up at all. He feels taken for granted, like he wasn’t a good enough trainer to encourage them to return. 

And after how they’d left things the last time they’d seen each other, things are already up in the air and a little blurry between them to begin with. He can only imagine the conclusions Keith must be jumping to, for this to be the very first appointment Lance has ever missed. Fuck.

Lance slowly begins to read through the texts in chronological order, bottom lip caught precariously between his teeth.

_ From: Keith. Sent: 7:05am _

_ “Running late again? Lol. You should pick me up a coffee on your way here.” _

Lance can somehow feel the anxiety radiating off of that “lol” even when thrown into such a casual message. He knows Keith well enough by now to know that he doesn’t use text lingo, he types perfectly punctuated sentences and he spells every word out. On the rare occasions he makes a typo, he immediately corrects it with an asterix. Keith doesn’t say “lol”.

_ From: Keith. Sent: 7:09am _

_ “Lance?? You’re still coming, right?” _

Lance hates himself so distinctly in this moment that he can hardly breathe. Even if he’d been forced to never see his family again out of lack of trust for himself, he’d always have them in his life. Even through calls and video chats, he would never in a million years cut-off all contact with them. He’s not strong enough for that. He needs them more than ever right now.

Keith is different though. Keith isn’t predetermined to love him by default, Keith doesn’t have to stick around through thick and thin. The harsh reality is, as much progress as Lance has made over weeks of working at it and chipping away at the walls Keith has up… his place in Keith’s life isn’t concrete yet. The ground they stand on is shakier than ever, if Lance backs off and disappears now, there might not  _ be _ any coming back.

What other option does he _ have _ though? He’s never had good control when it comes to Keith. Their entire relationship started with an impulse decision because Lance’s attraction to Keith was so intense he couldn’t do anything to fight it. Whose to say his attraction to Keith’s blood won’t be just as strong? 

He’s a danger to be around right now, but it’s a danger to everything they have to stay away.

_ From: Keith. Sent: 7:25am _

_ “Did something come up? Let me know.” _

Keith is trying so damn hard to be the understanding one, to reach out and utilize every bit of his stunted social skills before jumping to conclusions. And it hurts, to see Keith going out on a limb for him, to see that optimism there, to see that blind trust. Lance has poured himself into their relationship to be able to see the pay-off and now that he is, it’s with the knowledge that he’s gonna have to let it all go.

He _ knows _ he has to. 

He’d nearly lost control around a stranger. To be around Keith would be playing with fire.

_ From: Keith. Sent: 7:50am _

_ “I could have used this time for something more productive than waiting around for you to show. Better make it up to me next time with one of those really expensive coffees from that preppy place you go to.” _

That’s the most recent of the texts, from just a moment ago. Lance reads through them over and over again, begs himself to just type out a quick response to reassure Keith. Even if he has to cut all ties, surely he can do that much. He doesn’t want Keith to worry about him, or to blame himself for what has to happen next. It’s not his fault. It’s not Lance’s fault either, but that doesn’t matter. He has to pay the price and that’s the way it is.

His thumbs hover over the screen, seconds ticking by as he debates how he should excuse himself. He has to lie, obviously, that much is a given. Keith has good intuition though, especially when it comes to people, for as terrible as he is at interacting with them. Keith will see through any mediocre attempt at a lie, so it has to be something believable. 

Lance hesitates so long that his phone goes off in his hands again, another text bubble appearing at the bottom of the screen, right beneath where his thumbs are in limbo.

_ From: Keith. Sent: 7:52am _

_ “PS: I’m gonna work you extra hard on Wednesday as punishment for missing your appointment, so you’d best prepare yourself for that ;^)” _

Did Keith just… type out a winky face?

Nevermind the connotations of what that actually means in the context of their relationship, he _ typed _ it out? Didn’t even use one of the hundreds of pre-made emojis on his phone? Lance had always figured he just wasn’t the emoji type of guy, but now he’s wondering if maybe Keith literally does not know how to access them on his phone. And why does it have a nose?! Why the fuck did Keith take the time to add a nose to his homemade winky-face rather than just using an emoji?!

It’s so stupid. It’s so like _ Keith _ to constantly throw curveballs to leave you wondering. It shouldn’t be as endearing as it is, it has no right to be that fucking cute when the emoji-face itself is butt ugly...but it has Lance’s heart doing all sorts of funny things in his chest to think about Keith weighing his options, debating it heavily, and then still choosing to break all of his usual text patterns to send Lance a winky face of all things to make sure his innuendos don’t go unappreciated.

But the initial warmth it brings fades fast, leaves Lance alone again with the cold seeping out of somewhere deep inside his  _ dead _ body.

He can’t entertain this, can’t even pretend that those feelings are meant for him. He and the person Keith knows aren’t the same anymore, he isn’t the same Lance. He isn’t fueled by his mind, by his thoughts and his opinions, the beliefs he’d put into place from decades of being alive. He’s fueled by a simpler desire, by emotions stronger than he’s ever known them to be. He’s a dangerous monster, he isn’t the type of person you flirt with over text and start a relationship with.

He could _ kill  _ Keith. 

Even though it repulses and disgusts him to his core right now, he knows it would be a different story if Keith was here with him right this moment. If he could hear Keith’s heart pumping and smell the blood beneath his skin, who’s to say he wouldn’t do what any predator would do and  _ pounce _ ?

He’d only be lying to himself to think otherwise, and he’d only be hurting Keith to lead him on any further than he already has. He should reply and tell it to him straight, say that he’ll never be returning to the gym and he isn’t interested. And sure, it would be devastating for Lance to lie about it, but it’s for Keith’s own good and he would probably understand if he knew the circumstances.

But he doesn’t… know the circumstances.

All he’ll know is that Lance seemed interested for months and then changed his mind the very moment Keith started to reciprocate those feelings. He’ll blame himself, he’ll second-guess if it was ever real at all, he’ll… hurt. It’ll hurt Keith so much. He isn’t the type to open up to people easily, Lance has known that from the very beginning, but to have the rug pulled out from under him when he finally does?

Lance can’t bring himself to do it. He knows he _ should _ . He just… can’t. 

So he sets his phone right back down on the floor where it was, without responding to a single one of the texts sent to him. He vows to come back to it later, to figure it out when he feels more clear-headed and can do it properly. For now, he crawls back into his bed and rests his eyes, wishing desperately that he could fall asleep.

\--

The next week passes in a blur. He takes time off work. Time seems to move slower and faster at the same time, when all Lance’s mind is capable of thinking about is the hunger gnawing away at him and growing more all-consuming by the day. He’s sure he’s dying, his body showing more and more wear as the days pass until he looks more or less like the dead-for-seven-days-and-rotting corpse he should be. 

It gets harder to resist. For the first few days, he keeps himself locked up in his apartment, figures that should be enough. But six days in and he can hear his neighbor's heart beating through the walls separating their apartments, and it damn near drives him crazy having that constant thud be the soundtrack to his misery. That night, he finds himself blinking back into lucidity only to find himself at their door, poised to kick it in and help himself.

After that… Lance doesn’t go home. He’s not sure that a thing like him gets to have a home anymore. He opts instead to run as far away from civilization he can manage. He packs a few bags into the back of his Toyota Corolla and then he takes off. He leaves the city behind, until there’s nothing but trees lining either side of the road. It’s only when he hasn’t seen another pair of headlights in a good hour that he allows himself to pull over and set up camp for the night.

He’s never really been the type of guy that was interested in camping, but he’d gone with his family a few times as a child. Enough to know how to pitch a tent and cook his food on a kerosene stove. Not that he… needs to eat food anymore. So that’s one less thing to worry about.

It’s odd, how he can still feel afraid as he treks into the woods in the middle of nowhere. He doesn’t think he has the right to be when he’s been the beast lurking in the shadows for the better half of a week now, and his neighbors didn’t even get the decency of knowing they were being hunted. So if a bear claws its way through Lance’s tent and eats him alive tonight, it won’t be undeserved. The thought still terrifies him though.

That’s maybe the hardest part. The dueling consciousnesses in his mind. He hasn’t changed enough to believe he’s so far gone that there’s nothing left of who he used to be. He still has hopes and fears, he still feels love and pain, he’s still human just as much as he’s something else. Where is the line? 

He sets up camp beside a river, lights a fire and huddles up next to it until the moon is high in the sky over his head. He still can’t sleep, hasn’t been able to since he turned. So he has a lot of time on his hands to be alone with himself, with his thoughts. He’s not sure that that’s a good thing, though.

He’s getting weaker as time passes. His fangs sit heavy and present in his mouth at all times. His skin feels cold and clammy, like there isn’t life left beneath it. Last time he’d glanced in the rearview mirror, he’d caught a glimpse of his eyes and they were as red as the blood he longed to drink.

Before it felt like he was dying, but now he’s sure of it.

He’s not sure that that’s a bad thing, though.

And it’s better that it happens out here in the woods, where whoever finds his body could blame it on any manner of things and not jump to conclusions. He doesn’t want his family to know. He doesn’t want to die a vampire, he wants to die being the boy he’s always been.

It’s a depressing train of thought, so when a distraction comes in the form of his phone going off he jumps on the opportunity. People have been reaching out to him all week, friends asking to hang-out and family asking to video chat. He’s politely rejected every single offer, claiming he’s busy working on an important project for work. It’s a believable excuse, it wouldn’t be the first time he’s let his workaholic tendencies and desire for approval to take over his life. 

But this time, it isn’t Hunk, or a work colleague, or any one of his family members that have texted him.

_ From: Keith. Sent: 10:48pm _

_ “Hey again, it’s Keith. I’ve missed working with you this past week. Hope you’re well.” _

Lance reads that one line of text so many times his eyes burn like they’re on fire.

It’s achingly formal, which isn’t uncharacteristic for Keith, but it is uncharacteristic for them. They haven’t spoken to each other like that since the beginning. A part of Lance knows it must be a safety net of sorts, Keith’s attempt at getting him to talk by being completely neutral and approachable. It still hurts though, to see all of the progress he’d made backtrack and unravel. And he can’t help but try to read between the lines, to imagine what Keith must be feeling and choosing not to express right now.

He’s probably disappointed in Lance, probably feeling dejected and hurt, maybe even a little spiteful as well. Lance has met Keith’s temper before in passing and it’s not something to play with. 

Lance hadn’t responded to his previous texts, he kept putting it off until eventually it would have been weird to answer. He could never find the right thing to say, the right way to explain that they have to cut ties and never look back. Keith wouldn’t take a not-answer like that at face value, he’s too blunt of a guy to beat around the bush. He’d want the truth and nothing but the truth, but Lance can’t exactly tell him that. Nothing he says will be reason enough to end their relationship completely, not to Keith.

He’d be determined to fix whatever had broken, to press and push until he was back in Lance’s life again. 

At least… if he cares about Lance even half as much as Lance cares about him.

And selfishly, Lance really hopes he does.

He doesn’t respond to tonight’s text either. He does spend hours debating it, drafting and then deleting message after message until he has an ongoing bullet point list in his head of things to add when he finally writes the perfect message. He never does. He keeps waiting for it to happen naturally, but there’s no way of forcing it.

Besides, something even stranger happens that makes it impossible for him to reply. After pondering for hours and agonizing over what to say, it somehow tires Lance out enough that he… blacks out. He falls asleep that night for the first time in over a week. The blissful nothingness overtakes him and he’s allowed to rest, to not think for one goddamn second since this all happened to begin with. 

It’s strange really, sleeping as a vampire. It’s noticeably different than sleeping as a human. He doesn’t dream in shapes and images, but rather in aborted feelings that pass him by as fleetingly quick as they arrive. It’s hard to grab onto them enough to really acknowledge what any one thought is in itself. There is one recurring one, though.

_ Warmth _ . He feels so warm. Down to his bones and past them, to that cold place inside of his heart.

It’s heaven.

\--

Until he wakes up, and then it’s distinctly hell on Earth.

Lance doesn’t get the liberty of a slow awakening, of taking the time to come to terms with the idea of consciousness and slowly drift back into its hold. He comes back to himself all at once, like a rubber band snapping back against skin, like his soul has been sucked back into his chest.

He’s on his feet and on the move when he starts to actually see through his already-open eyes, which gives him reason to believe that maybe he hadn’t been asleep at all.

The next dead giveaway is the fact his entire line of sight is red. Not as in he can’t see anything but a solid wall of color, but in the sense that everything he  _ can _ see is painted with it. The couch along the far wall of the room he’s never been in or seen before in his life, the carpet that might have once been cream that lines the floor under his feet, even the brick of the fireplace is dripping  _ red _ .

His stomach drops with the weight of the situation, because he already knows. Even before he focuses on the weight in his arms, even before he looks down to see it for himself, he knows.

How? He can  _ taste  _ it.

The inside of his mouth must be painted just as red as the room around him. Its thick and rich, and as much as he wants to be disgusted by it and double over to throw it all back up, instead he finds himself swallowing around it and sucking his tongue clean for more. It’s misery, how much he can’t resist it, even now that the gnawing hunger is gone and left behind is just a sense of sated fullness and warmth. 

It takes a while to work up the nerve to look. 

He spends a few minutes sitting there and staring up at the ceiling, willing God to smite him then and there. Lance is a whole lot of things, he’s never claimed to be a perfect individual, he has his flaws. But he refuses to be a murderer. Whoever, whatever did this… it wasn’t him. Lance isn’t a violent person, he never has been. Even when he was younger and he’d get into fights with his older siblings, the guilt had consumed him every time he’d accidentally hurt them and he’d tattle on himself to their mother with tacky tears lining his face.

He’s crying now, but he forces himself to try and think through the onslaught of pain the memories dredges up. What’s done is done, all that’s left to do is… keep moving forward. 

He looks.

He’s not sure if it makes it better or worse to see that the stranger is an older woman, someone with greyed hair and wrinkles that had already lived a long life. Though, when you live that long he doubts that this is the way you want to go out either. And when you live such a long life, you’re bound to make bonds and ties to many people over the years. She’s probably a grandmother, a wife, a sister, a dear friend. And now she’s gone because of Lance.

The body is still warm, but the woman in Lance’s arms is lifeless. There’s no use begging for miracles or wasting time checking for a pulse, not when there’s hardly a neck left to examine with the way it’s been flayed apart with countless gashes and cuts. It’s a cruel joke that all of the vampire lore had always showed off two pinprick bite marks and dismissed that as what a vampire attack looked like.

Sure, that’s what Lance walked away with when all was said and done, but back at the grocery store he remembers being torn into like a victim of a bear mauling too. Vampires are messy eaters, even if some can cover their tracks by turning their meals into members of the undead.

A new layer of horror envelopes Lance at the thought, as he stares wide-eyed at the body. She’s obviously not alive, but does that translate into being dead when you’re dealing with a vampire attack? How does he know that he didn’t turn her into one of them? Is there a trick to it, a trade secret that his maker should have informed him of? God, how the hell is he supposed to know?!

He’s not a terrible enough person to leave her alone with it either. If she wakes up after everything that’s happened to her, then she deserves to hear it from the source. Lance won’t leave her like he was left, to sort through the confusion and the pain alone, without a single living soul on the planet that understands. He may be a murderer, but he isn’t a monster yet.

… And that’s how Lance ends up spending the next twenty-four hours babysitting an elderly woman’s dead body.

There are probably worse ways to spend a Monday.

Laura Ingram is a seventy-three year old widow with two children that live out of state, a bingo club that meets once a week on Thursdays, and an in-home senior care worker who comes every other day to keep her company and help with housekeeping. Lance finds this information through various means, such as examining the photos on her fridge, checking out the calendar on the wall, and eventually snooping through her wallet when the boredness became unbearable. All in all, it’s sort-of fun piecing together clues to understand Laura’s life... You know, ignoring the fact that he took it from her and everything. That significantly lowers the fun-levels.

He leaves her on the couch, props her body up against the arm rest as he wanders around the house and waits. It took less than twelve hours for him to rise from the dumpster he’d been dumped in, so he can’t imagine it would take her any longer than that.

The strangest thing is, the longer he spends in her house and getting to know her, the more he almost starts to look forward to when she wakes up. He can think of worse people to grant immortality to. And it wouldn’t necessarily be such a bad thing to have a friend that understands what he’s going through, someone he can talk to about all of this. And Laura was probably lonely herself, longing for company that wasn’t paid to be there for her. 

Besides, he’s always wanted to learn how to cross stitch and Laura’s house is just covered in her crafty projects. He’s got all of eternity to learn now, what better time to pick up a new hobby?

It’s just… well… the sun sets low behind the trees and the moon takes its place, and Laura still hasn’t moved an inch from where he placed her. She’s still dead. 

Lance tries his very hardest not to feel disappointed. He tries not to long for what could have been between them, but it’s really hard not to when he’s so fucking desperate for companionship anywhere he can get it. He would give anything to have someone that understood what he was going through. Someone to look to for answers, for comfort.

It also means accepting the fact that he’s actually killed a person. The kind of killing that they don’t come back from. The kind of killing that takes everything they have and gives nothing back. She’s dead. Really and truly dead. And Lance killed her, drank the life from her veins to extend his.

He isn’t sitting there next to a person, a potential friend. There is no hope to cling to, no anticipation for everything to suddenly be okay. This is it. He’s sitting there next to a corpse of his own making.

The panic and hysteria sets in anew, until his vision is so blurred by tears that he can hardly determine what he’s doing as he stumbles out into the darkness of the forest. He knows he can’t leave her like that, can’t traumatize anyone by making them stumble across such a gruesome scene. But more than that… he has to cover his own ass. As much as he doesn’t deserve it, she gave her life for Lance to hold onto whatever’s left of his, and he won’t take that sacrifice for granted by letting himself get caught. He’s going to live and he’s going to do better, for Laura’s sake.

There’s a jug of gasoline in the storage shed.

It lights up in an instant when the match hits it.

Within minutes, the entire living room is up in flames and it’s spreading toward the rest of the house.

The building is far enough into the wilderness that it’ll take a while for help to reach them, and by that point all of the evidence will be gone. Lance’s tracks will be covered. It’ll be like he was never there.

Aside from the questionable outfit he’d stolen from her wardrobe so he wasn’t walking around in bloodstained rags… Lance left nothing behind at the crime scene, and he took nothing from it. It’s as clean of a break as he can make. Aside from the fact his fingerprints are probably all over the fucking place because he wasn’t exactly thinking about discretion when he barged inside in a bloodthirsty haze.

It’s fine. It has to be.

He wanders until he stumbles across the road, at which point he lifts his hand to every car that passes him by. Eventually, a man in a pick-up truck stops and offers to drive him to the nearest gas station. He seems nice, with kind brown eyes and black hair peppered with white. And the best part? Lance can look at him, talk to him, and sit next to him without being consumed with the desire to tear him apart with his teeth. Lance’s fangs don’t even make an appearance once throughout the entire drive they share together.

If it weren’t for the shaking in his hands, the nausea in the pit of his stomach from the guilt… Lance would almost say that he feels like himself again after feeding. 

\--

When Lance eventually makes it home, after collecting his car and belongings from the campsite it took forever to find again… he finds himself feeling antsy. After finally feeding, he is full of energy in a way he hasn’t been since starting this new life. Hell, even when he’d first woken up after being turned, it’d almost been like he was running on a half-empty charge. Now, he feels almost high with the amount of adrenaline and energy bouncing around inside his skull.

And the thing is, he’s no stranger to access energy or a lack of concentration. He’s dealt with those things his entire life, since way before the official ADHD diagnosis brought him some semblance of understanding. He’s struggled through school, struggled to focus on his hobbies that he actually enjoys, he’s been the foot-tapper and the pencil clicker his entire life. He’s learnt coping mechanisms, he’s learnt the unique ways that his mind works and the steps he needs to take to optimize productivity when he needs to.

He’s even experienced the hyperfixation side of things, when his thoughts get stuck on one track and can’t get off, left to go in circles and circles like a broken record. An obsessive amount of investment and passion, he’d done his fair share of overwhelming people with his interests and his affection.

But… he’s never had to pair all of that with his newfound vampiric traits and powers.

He can’t eat, the food tastes like garbage in comparison to the blood he thrives on now. 

He can’t sleep, not even a wink, and his body seems to protest the idea with even more energy any time he attempts to lie down and rest. 

He can’t even sit down and watch fucking tv, because the sights and the bright colors strain his heightened sense of sight and leave him with a splitting migraine. It’s like he can pick apart the individual pixels of the screen, rather than the images themselves. It’s a nightmare. 

He can pace, sure, but his pacing quickly devolves into speeding back and forth across his apartment with such a concerning amount of speed that he’s pretty sure he leaves smoke rising from the fibres of his carpet. That’s… not a human amount of speed to have, thanks.

When all of the above fails him, Lance tries to mess around bouncing a ball off the wall. It isn’t exactly a permanent solution, but he has no idea what else to do. He ends up underestimating his strength, the ball coming flying back at him with such a speed that he’s pretty sure it would kill a normal human. As it is, he uses his inhuman speed and ducks just in time to send it flying into the flatscreen instead. 

His beloved television, his 65” HD smart-tv with surround sound. Shattered into a thousand itty bitty pieces from a fucking rubber bouncy ball. 

Lance could cry.

By some miracle, he pulls himself together before the tears start really falling and simply removes himself from the room. He heads into his bedroom instead, crawls into the nook by the window and decides to fall back on his age-old favorite habit when he’s feeling most alone and hopeless.

The streets below aren’t particularly populated, but there are enough people traveling them to keep Lance interested. He’s always loved people-watching, especially when he felt like an alien in his own skin, had desperately longed for a place to fit in. He has all of that now, so it’s been a while since he’s been in this position. He feels like a confused teenager all over again though, unsure how they fit into the grand picture of the world around them.

Does he even have a place in the picture now? He’s… he’s a fucking murderer. He killed a defenseless elderly woman in her own home. He’s clearly not safe to be around. He has no right to be sitting here fighting the overwhelming urge to go down there and join the people below, to satiate himself with their presence and maybe their blood, he isn’t sure how to differentiate between the two urges yet. 

He’s lonely, obviously, he’s been isolating himself for a week… but can he trust that all he wants is their company? 

His phone dings with an incoming text and this time he isn’t strong enough to keep himself from checking it right away. He fishes it out of his pocket, isn’t surprised as he normally would be to see Keith’s name on the screen. It’s exactly what he deserves, really. More salt in the wound, another reason for his heart to ache, a reminder of everything he’s lost.

_ From: Keith. Sent: 8:13pm _

_ “Look, I know it’s not my place, at the end of the day our relationship is a professional one. I just wish you’d fill me in on what happened so maybe we could work something out. If you can’t fit three appointments a week into your schedule anymore just say the word. You were really working toward your goals so well, I was genuinely impressed by your determination and I’d hate to see it go to waste.” _

Lance dwells on the blatant praise, tries his best to ignore the underlying air of disappointment to the words. He knows Keith expected more of him. In truth, he expected more of himself. Not with the exercising, he’s impressed that he’s managed to stay dedicated to that as long as he has. No, he expected better of himself when it came to how he’s treating Keith. He should tell him. Should break things off in plain terms.

Leaving Keith wondering and hopeful for something that may never be is the cruelest thing he can do.

_ From: Keith. Sent: 8:15pm _

_ “Talk to you soon maybe? _

Ah, damn it. Lance can’t take it anymore. He can’t take seeing Keith put himself out there like this and be met with nothing but silence. Lance has gone through countless crippling rejects, he knows how hard and how deeply it hurts. He never wants to inflict that on Keith, especially so needlessly. He does feel the same! He just… can’t. He can’t allow himself to.

But Lance can’t deny that he misses Keith, and that it’s something fierce and distracting. He’d been sitting here desperate for something to focus on, anything other than the misery. It comes to him in the form of thinking about Keith. Which was, surprisingly, the one thing he hadn’t tried to pass the time with considering it’s been his favorite thing to do for months.

Keith with his stupidly genuine encouragement, always seeing the best in Lance and expecting great things from him, but never coming off as pressuring. Keith with his cute little dimples and the swishing short little ponytail at the nape of his neck. Keith who is clearly going out of his way to reach out to Lance, to be accommodating and approachable, to win him back.

Fuck.

Lance types out a quick response full of excuses and false promises to come back, but he doesn’t send it.

Lance types out a series of believable lies explaining why he isn’t coming back and why Keith needs to give up on ever seeing him again, but he doesn’t send it.

Lance types out an agonizingly long and detailed response explaining the truth, but he definitely doesn’t send that one.

In the end, it all leaves him even more dissatisfied than he was in the first place.

\--

Three days pass and the hunger starts to amount again, like the steady climb of a rollercoaster where that pit in your stomach grows and grows in anticipation before the drop. He can smell his neighbors through the walls again, like a bloodhound to the trail.

\--

Five days in and Lance knows that he’s running out of time if he wants this to happen his way, while he has some semblance of control left and can hopefully pull it off without murdering his victim. It’s a sad truth, but it’s best he addresses it now before it happens again. He can’t control himself if he waits, all he can do is hope that he can now.

\--

Six days in and Lance finds himself dressed up in his nicest clothes, hanging out in a nightclub that he’s never been to before on the far side of town. He really does not want to get recognized tonight, not with what he’s about to do. He hopes that it goes down smoother than last time, but to be perfectly honest his expectations are low right from the start.

The nightclub is a steady thrum of bass and moving bodies, covered in sweat with heat gathering between them and blood rising to the surface. Where as a human Lance would find the environment distasteful and maybe the slightest bit gross, now he finds it overstimulating in the best kinds of ways. He hardly has his first foot through the door when his fangs slide down from his gums and fill his mouth, aching and longing for a person to make a home out of. 

Lance treks further into the club, gets himself a drink despite not even being sure if it affects him anymore. It’s more a force of habit than anything else, as he leans back against the bar and surveys the room. He ought to go for a bulky guy, someone who could stand to lose a bucket of blood and not die from the loss. But he’s also not entirely confident in his vampire strength when he isn’t hyped up on a fresh feeding, he’s not sure he could pin a muscular guy if things went awry, which they’re prone to do when he’s out to nonconsensually steal blood from another person like a leech.

There’s also a new problem… arising.

In the literal sense.

See, okay, Lance has never had this problem before, thank-you very fucking much. Even as a horny teenager with hormones raging and a big fat bisexual crush on a different person every week… he had never been the fucking guy popping boners at inopportune moments. He had control over himself, he had limits, he had the decency not to let his thoughts get out of hand in public. 

That changed with Keith. Obviously, guy’s a fucking wet dream and he insisted on wearing those tight fitting clothes that left nothing to the imagination, and speaking in almost entirely sexual innuendos without realizing it, and flexing his stupid muscles and his physical prowess like it was nothing. The point is, Lance’s mind didn’t even have to wander when Keith was around. The sex thoughts were right fucking there, by default, because Keith was a living fantasy and for some reason he was hellbent on being all up in Lance’s space during their sessions. Maybe because that’s his job as a trainer or whatever, but the point is Lance was a constant puddle of horny when that man was around.

Keith was the only exception to the no-boners-in-public rule. 

And now here Lance is… cock half-hard in his jeans as he observes the people moving about the room like a hawk circling an unsuspecting prey. He watches the bodies writhe together on the dancefloor, glimpses a couple guys making out in the far corner of the room, sees a dancer effortlessly swirl around the pole with only the use of the muscles in her thighs. He feels like a ticking bomb primed to explode right now, and he’s not sure if he means it in the horny or the murdery way.

Absentmindedly, as he keeps his gaze glued to the dancer flaunting her body (and, frankly amazing dance skills), he wonders if feeding and sex are something that inherently go hand-in-hand for vampires.

He can see why it might be possible. The hunger for blood isn’t the same as the hunger for food had been when he was alive. It isn’t an uncomfortable ache, bordering on pain. Well, not at first. At first it’s just an itch that he can’t quite scratch, a thought haunting the back of his mind and growing louder as the days pass, a literal lust for blood. It’s a desire as much as it’s a necessity, if not more.

He’s conflicted by that, doesn’t  _ want _ to want to drink blood, but the fact is that he does. 

Even freshly-after draining Laura, he’d had control over himself, but a part of him had still felt that temptation when he climbed into the truck with the stranger who had picked him up. It was faraway, not a demanding thing as much as needling little idea. But it was definitely there. Because every single person seemed to smell differently, so it seemed warranted to assume they all had a completely individual taste to them too. Is anyone surprised that he would want to try _ all  _ the food at the banquet?

A part of him is almost disappointed his mind completely blanked while he fed that first time. It was his own fault for letting it get to that point that he was reduced to some feral blood-hungry beast running on instinct, maybe if he had fed earlier he could have prevented what happened to her.

But the fact is, he blacked it all out and the memories haven’t come back to him, he doesn’t think they’re going to. So, technically speaking, this seems like his first time actively trying to feed. He’s experiencing it all for the first time that he can remember. He doesn’t know how exactly his fangs work, doesn’t know where or how to bite, doesn’t know if it’s a fucking sex thing or not. God, he hopes it wasn’t a sex thing when he brutally murdered that little old lady. _ Did he get off on it _ ? 

Okay, ew, terrible train of thought, he’s losing his appetite and his confidence in himself to pull this off.

Reel it back in, McClain, let’s try this again.

He spots a couple of people that seem like possible candidates, but the longer he spends hesitating and watching them, the more he questions himself. They’re just people, going about their day and living their lives, interacting with their friends and having a good time. How can he pick any one of them knowing that he might lose control and take that life away from them? He can’t.

He slides into one of the stools and buries his face in his hands against the bar, debates whether he should just go home and starve himself some more. At least then he’ll black out when the time comes, won’t remember the awful things he does to another person. 

“Hi, excuse me?” Lance looks up from the bar he’d been glaring holes into, instead focusing his eyes on the woman leaning into his space. She’s pretty, with bouncy curls in her black hair and warm brown eyes, dressed in the finest of revealing outfits. She might have been Lance’s type at one point, but now he finds himself sniffing the air and immediately recoiling. Her blood doesn’t smell rich and thick, it smells thin and tasteless, and Lance wonders if she could possibly be ill or if vampires come with a taste palette. 

Either way, he’s not interested. He’s still wondering if he’s interested in feeding at all tonight. And he definitely didn’t fucking come here for sex, no matter what his body is trying to tell him.

“Can I help you with something?” Lance asks, flashing a quick smile. Member of the undead or not, his mama would have his head if he was ever rude to a stranger for no good reason, she raised him much better than that. The girl seems delighted with the positive response, her hand coming down to grip Lance’s bicep. His cock gives a damningly interested twitch against his thigh and that only leaves him more confused on whether the sexual urges have anything to do with the hungry ones. 

“Okay, so… here’s the thing. My friend thinks you’re _ really  _ cute. She sent me over here to ask if you’d maybe be interested in getting a drink with her.” There’s a series of giggles that follows the statement that makes it hard to determine whether she’s even being serious or not. It’s clear now that she’s spoken more than three words that she’s definitely intoxicated, probably heavily if the way she sways when he shifts her hand off his arm is anything to go by. Lance sniffs the air again and if he concentrates really hard, he can smell the alcohol radiating off of her underneath the obvious pull of her blood. 

“Is she as drunk as you are?” Lance scoffs, dismissive right from the start. He wasn’t interested before, and he definitely isn’t interested now.

“Depends what you _ want  _ me to say.” The girl wiggles her eyebrows a bit, flashes him another convincing smile. He draws a deep breath, exhales it through his mouth in a sigh. He’s noticing that his temper isn’t quite as easy to control as it might have been before, especially not when he’s hungry.

“No, I’m not going to take advantage of her like th-” And then Lance pauses. Thinks about it a little. Of course he isn’t gonna take advantage of her sexually, he’s not a fucking pig. But, well, this opportunity is sort-of presenting itself to him, isn’t it? Whether he likes it or not, he needs to eat, like anything else in the food chain does. And if he can do it without actually killing his prey? Well, it’s better he finds out now rather than needlessly hurt other people.

“You interested or not?” The girl asks, her voice taking on just a hint of a drunken slur toward the end of the question. Lance braces himself around a wince, tries to make it as discreet as possible as he mentally prepares himself for what’s about to go down. Not that she would notice that anything is out of the ordinary anyway, with how tipsy she clearly is.

“Y-Yeah, okay. Send her over here.” 

It all happens too fast after that. One second he’s sitting alone with a feeling of apprehension he can’t shake, and then the next there’s a woman sliding into the seat beside him. She looks confident, she smells better than her friend had, and she’s just as hammered. She’s, in the worst ways, the perfect target. Lance feels a pang of bitterness toward her friends for setting her up like this rather than sticking with her. They don’t even know Lance! For all they know he could be a terrible person, a kidnapper, a human trafficker, a… well, it wouldn’t exactly be a stretch to say that he _ is _ a murderer now (even if it wasn’t exactly an intentional thing).

She extends a hand to him and he takes it, has to sink his fangs into his bottom lip hard to keep himself under control the moment he feels her warm skin against his cold palms. Even with the nerves building and the pressure amounting, he can’t deny that a primal part of him is getting more and more excited the closer he gets to another person. 

“Hey, I’m Plaxum.” The woman introduces herself, squeezing his hand a little tighter. He nods, memorizing the name because he’s never heard it before in his life, and then quickly offering her his own. She seems nervous herself, like maybe she doesn’t normally do this sort-of thing. Well, it can be a first for both of them for different reasons.

“Lance.” He tells her gently, wishing he could smile at her. The current situation of his bloodied fangs and mauled lip might send her running though. His healing definitely gets slower the longer he goes without feeding, so he can’t expect his lip to heal until he’s got her blood helping him along. The pain is a welcome distraction though, something other than the overwhelming pleasure and excitement coursing through him. It’s the only lifeline he has to cling to if he wants to ground himself when she’s so close, so available, so appealing.

“It’s nice to meet you, Lance.” Plaxum seems like a nice girl, all smiles and giggles, bubbly in a way that’s usually beaten out of most people by their mid-twenties. It’s a shame that they aren’t meeting each other under different circumstances, at a different point in Lance’s life. 

It’s been a long time since Lance has gone out anywhere with the intention of picking up girls, any game that he might have once had has been replaced with just a hint of desperation. And, up until this vampire business, it hadn’t even been the sexual kind of desperation. It was a longing to settle down, to love and be loved, to have someone to hold for longer than a night. He wanted something meaningful now, and he wasn’t foolish enough to think he might find it in a nightclub. He wonders if Plaxum here can tell just how much he doesn’t want to be here, that their intentions are nothing alike. 

“You wanna get of here?” Lance says, straight to the chase, blunt to the point of uncomfortable. He has nothing to lose, he isn’t going to sit here and torture himself with small talk and playing games. He doesn’t have it in him to flirt with her, to try and charm his way into her pants. He doesn’t want to think about this any harder than he absolutely has to and his body is anything but patient for what’s to come next. 

Luckily, she seems just as apt to speed things along and get what she wants. 

“Yeah, I was hoping you’d say something like that.” Plaxum reaches over, slots a hand on his thigh and then slides it down to cup at the apex of his groin. He hisses out a breath through his teeth, fangs almost aching with a need to be biting down on something. His cock is fully hard now and he’s not looking forward to the waddle of shame he’s going to need to do toward the exit.

“I’m parked around back, do you want to take that exit?”

“Sure.” She doesn’t even bat an eye at the questionable suggestion, just rises to her feet and lets Lance slip an arm around her waist. He leads her toward the blinking neon of the exit sign, the sound of her pulse thudding steadily in his ears even louder than the base of the music. His hand curls around her hip protectively, just tight enough that it’s probably uncomfortable. Every head that turns in their direction, he shoots a glare back at them. There’s a level of possessiveness making itself known now that he has something to guard, something to covet. 

“So, what do you do for a living?” Lance asks awkwardly, trying to ignore how much he can feel his humanity taking a backseat to whatever else is living inside of him now. She seems startled that he’s spoken up, turning to him with a puzzled little pout to her lips. He licks his at the sight.

“I’m sorry, I wasn’t expecting you to take an interest in me as a person. Just so we’re clear, this is just a sex thing, right? I’m not looking for anything serious right now and I’d hate to lead you on.” She tells him, and even though she’s all but rejecting him, it’s still said so sweetly and with so much care. She’s a good person, that much is clear, and he doesn’t want to do anything at all to hurt her. But he’s also not sure he could stop himself now if he tried, his arm has a vise-like grip on her waist and he feels physically compelled to keep it that way, to not let her out of arm’s reach.

“No, I know. We want the same thing, I’m just trying to break the ice.” Lance explains, eyeing the exit up ahead. The hallway is a short one, but it seems impossibly long when his patience is waning so thin. But there are people here too, lots of them, crowding each other against the wall and into corners. It’s the only place in the club with any semblance of privacy aside from the bathrooms, and these couples are certainly taking advantage of the lack of wandering eyes.

But Lance needs far more privacy than this for what he’s about to do.

“I’m an aspiring business owner. I own an online boutique where I design my own clothes.”

“Cool, cool.” Lance reaches for the door, pushes it open and holds it for Plaxum. She smiles up at him, big and doe-eyed, and he feels like the wolf in sheep’s clothing. She seems so flattered by the bare minimum he’s giving her, so easily deceived by it, so quick to put her trust in him. A part of him is glad he comes across as someone trustworthy, and before he would have celebrated that fact, but not it just makes him feel a tad gross. “You have a big family?”

“What?”

“Do you have lots of people that care about you?” Lance specifies, and this is what throws her for a pause. She freezes in the doorway, giving him an uncomfortable once-over, like she’s maybe starting to piece together that the intensity behind the questions isn’t a casual curiosity. Lance is scoping her out, learning about her personal life and what might be lost if he messes up tonight.

Seeing the amounting panic there, Lance takes matters into his own hand and steps closer. He concentrates on making his voice smooth and convincing, trying to stretch out a newly-discovered muscle. He’s not sure how the mind-compulsion thing works, only knows that he’s probably going to need to use it later tonight and might as well experiment more now. “ _ Answer me _ .”

She stutters to life like an old car finally catching on the fifth turn of the key in the ignition.

“Um, just my older brother! He’s helping me through college and we share an apartment for now. Our parents aren’t around anymore and we have no extended family.”

“What about your friends?” Lance asks, nodding his head to the building behind them. She shivers in the open doorway, fidgeting against the early-December breeze. Eventually, she shakes her head.

“It’s debatable how much they care, I guess I’ll put it that way.” 

There’s something about the confession that hits Lance a little harder than even the bloodlust does, it brings him back to memories of past friendships and circles he’d found himself in during his school years when he was most desperate to fit in. He’d given everything up to people that wouldn’t lift a finger for his well-being. The same way these girls willingly let Plaxum walk away with a strange man the moment they could. As ironic as it is given the situation, Lance feels oddly protective as he steps outside and slips an arm back around her.

As they head down the alley running adjacent to the building, she’s left practically leaning into Lance’s side for support. He happily cradles her into the curve of his chest. There’s a few crowds of people gathered outside against the walls of the building, huddled together in groups. There’s the smell of weed in the air and it’s stronger than Lance has ever experienced it before with his newly-enhanced sense of scent. 

This won’t do. Too many people passing through this alley on their travels. He needs to find someplace more secluded, less-traveled. Especially because their presence is setting him on-edge now more than ever, he feels like everyone is the enemy until he’s fed and knows they won’t keep her from him. His eyes rapidly scan the area in search of a quiet alcove or corner to duck into, adrenaline building now that he’s so close to getting what he wants. She feels like a wall of heat pressed into his side and he wants to fucking bury himself into her and  _ burn _ . 

It’s all too easy to lead her off-course, away from the club and into the shadows. If she was paying attention, she’d realize there’s no place in this direction that he possibly could have parked. As it is, she’s distracted herself by untucking Lance’s shirt from where it’s shoved into his pants. She pulls it free, slips her hand up underneath the smooth silky material, fans her fingers out across his stomach and gently explores the outline of his abs.

It’s all Lance can do to keep from snapping then and there, pushing her against the brick wall and taking what he wants. He’s so fucking hungry, his hands are shaking with it, each footstep clumsy and stiff as his thirst grows to something all-consuming. He wants so feverishly he feels like his vision might even be going blurry from it. It’s hard to focus on anything but the smell of her blood, the sound of her steady pulse.

Strangely, it’s almost like he can smell the  _ arousal _ in it too. She wants this badly, wants him. It makes it even easier to lose himself in it, to indulge in how badly he wants her back. 

His steps grow heavy and impatient, until he’s practically speedwalking as he ducks his head down alley after alley. Eventually, he finds one dark enough to seclude them. It’s a thin little crawlspace of an alley, barely enough room for two people to walk side-by-side, but he reckons they won’t need much room for what he has planned anyway. 

“Lance?” Plaxum asks, peering into the creepy alley. “Why are we stopping?”

Alright, Lance, use some rational thought here and don’t scare the poor girl.

He turns to her slowly, as not to startle, and gives her a small smile. She mirrors the expression, though a lot less convincingly, the suspicion still shining through her eyes. Charm in itself isn’t going to be enough, he hadn’t really expected it to be. Instead he channels his focus, stares her dead in the eye, uses the firmest voice he can manage.

“You’re gonna let me bite you.”

It’s not a question, not a request, not even a demand. He simply says it like it’s common knowledge, a fact that isn’t open to discussion. It works. She blinks a few times and then nods slowly, hesitant but clearly going along with whatever he says. Lance wonders if this mind compulsion thing has limits, if there’s a risk of her breaking out of the trance when he actually bites her and the shock of it stirs her subconscious. 

Ugh, he really doesn’t want to wait anymore. He’s barely sure that he can. Seeing her standing there, looking to him for guidance on what to do next, so very willing to please. It’s doing things to him that he’s far from proud of. His fangs feel a hundred times more present than normal, it’s a struggle to speak or think around their presence in the front of his mouth. He licks his tongue around one, revels in the pressure against his sore gums.

He steps closer to the girl, trying to keep his movements slow and easy no matter, clinging to his control by a very thin thread in serious danger of snapping. It doesn’t help at all that she moves with him, plasters herself against the brickwork, settles a hand on his hip and pulls him in close. She’s still aroused, her mind working overtime to make sense of what’s happening and probably coming to the conclusion that it’s something sexual. Still… there’s the smell of fear there too, something that unsettles Lance to his core. He doesn’t want that, doesn’t want something so sour and undesirable to taint this experience or the taste of her blood.

He leans in, presses their foreheads together and stares into her eyes at the much closer proximity. 

Something instinctual seems to be guiding him now, something that knows what it’s doing far more than he could hope to. It’s not like last time though, he’s still very much in his right mind and present for everything that’s happening. He’s just following impulse, trusting what his body is telling him.

“You’re gonna let me bite you and you’re not gonna feel _ any _ pain, physically or emotionally. You’re going to think happy thoughts. Then, when I’m done, you’re gonna forget that any of it happened. E-Even if there’s blood, or a bite mark, you won’t remember it and you won’t question how it got there. You won’t remember me at all. As soon as it’s done, you’ll go home and clean yourself up, then go to bed.” Lance speaks in an even tone, she listens with rapt fascination to every single word. The investment in her eyes is obvious, she’s really taking every order to heart. Lance isn’t sure how that makes him feel, but it is a relief to know that there won’t be a struggle. He’s not sure that he’d have the heart for that, he’d likely let her go at the first sign of genuine discomfort even with how feral and unhinged he’s feeling with their bodies pressed so close together.

The moment she relaxes her shoulders and his directions seem to sink in, Lance leans down and noses his way down to her neck. He inhales deeply all the while, drinking in the scent of her and resisting the urge to pounce on her to chase more of it. His cock is so hard it honestly hurts, twitching needily in the tight confines of his jeans. A part of him desperately wants to reach down and cup at it over his clothes, readjust himself and try to get more comfortable. He has the decency not to though, mostly because he knows it wouldn’t stop at that, and his willpower would only shrink.

Instead he tries to focus on why he’s actually here, nuzzling into the curve of her neck and inhaling sharply, scenting her. The thud of her heartbeat is like a drum pounding in his head now, blocking out every other thought. He licks his lips again, inadvertently darting his tongue across her skin before he can think better of it. He groans before he can stop himself, a low pleased noise rumbling from his throat so suddenly it catches him off guard. 

He pulls back, mostly to test his control rather than anything else. Everything in him protests the movement, loathes every inch of space he puts between them, but he holds his ground. He doesn’t slip up, doesn’t crack under the pull. It’s tempting, damn tempting as he rakes his eyes over the body in front of him, but… that’s all it is. He can fight the temptation. He doesn’t lose himself to it.

Hopefully the same can be said after he gets a taste of her blood.

Plaxum, to her credit, absolutely looks like she’s in her happy place. She looks like she’s on cloud nine, head tipped back and legs trembling beneath her, bottom lip caught between her teeth and blunt nails digging into the harsh brick behind her. She looks mid-orgasm, for fuck’s sake, he said he wanted her to be happy not in ecstasy. Whatever. It’s fine. At least it’s not fear. 

“One last thing before it happens.” Lance says suddenly, the thought occurring to him impulsively. He wants to get it off his chest now, before whatever happens actually happens. Plaxum cracks her eyes open, regarding him with a heavily-lidded gaze that sends shivers down his spine. He wishes he could avert his eyes and collect himself, but he’s pretty sure this only works if he’s holding eye contact the entire time. And he really wants this message to sink in. “Next time your friends take you for granted and don’t stand by you when you need them most? Call them out on it. If they don’t make an effort to do better by you, then respect yourself enough to walk away.”

His words hang in the air for a long moment, as she seemingly struggles to process them in whatever state of mind she’s in right now. Eventually though, she smiles at him, wide and bright.

“I will.” She promises, reaching up between them to press a hand to his cheek. He leans into the touch without thinking, pressing a lingering kiss to her palm and fighting the urge to sink his teeth in as he pulls away. Almost mindlessly, her hand drifts back down between them and she undoes the top two buttons of his shirt with deft fingers. Lance gulps, looking down the length of his body. It takes him a couple seconds, until his shirt is hanging loosely from his frame, but he grabs her wrist and forces it back to her side.

This isn’t a sex thing. Well, it sort-of is, he’s not sure that he can undo the way that vampires are wired out of sheer willpower alone. But he’s not going to actually  _ do _ anything sexual with her, not when she’s doubly impaired with alcohol and mind-control, there’s no way she can give any form of credible consent like that. He’ll just… do what he came here for and keep it in his pants.

“Um, can you… tilt your head to the side?” He’s speaking with a lisp, damn it. Stupid fangs. It makes his nerves all the more obvious. He sounds just like he did when he was fifteen and falling onto a basement couch at a school dance afterparty, when the reality had just hit him that he was about to lose his virginity. 

Plaxum doesn’t hesitate, immediately rolling her neck and exposing the long pale column of her throat to him. She bats her eyelashes up at him, completely pliant to his wishes. He whimpers, caving the slightest bit and reaching down to unbutton his pants. He doesn’t touch himself though, just lets it relieve some of the amounting pressure because he’s pretty sure he’s never been this hard in his life... not even at that aforementioned afterparty when he’d blown his load thirty seconds in.

“This might hurt.” He warns, genuine, looking into her eyes in warning. She just chuckles though, shaking her head fondly, like she knows something that he doesn’t.

“No, it won’t. I won’t feel anything.”

“Oh. Right. Thanks for the reminder.” Lance laughs awkwardly around the lump in his throat, rolls his shoulders and shakes out his limbs to loosen himself up. He’s stalling for time, he knows he is. The longer he keeps them standing here though, the more likely they are to be caught or interrupted. He can’t have that, the mere thought has something akin to a growl vibrating in his chest. He doesn’t even  _ want  _ to know what he’d do if someone attempted to pull him away from her once he gets going.

Newly spurred-on, he shuffles closer to her, plasters their bodies together and buries his face back into her pulse point. He feels oddly at home there. He feels so warm, from head to toe, can feel the heat radiating off of her body. It’s peace like he hasn’t known in days, the blissful relaxation that his restless mind has been chasing. Lance smiles into her neck fondly, almost giddy with all the sensations.

He doesn’t mean to do it yet, doesn’t mean for the smile to result in him feeling the soft give of her skin against the tips of his fangs. Without any pressure behind them, they haven’t even drawn blood yet, are just scratching the surface. But the second he feels it, his body comes alive with urges stronger than anything he’s ever tried to fight. His control slips through his fingers like sand.

He bites down hard, using the full strength of his jaw to drive his fangs in deep. She gasps, despite the claim that there would be no pain, though maybe it’s the shock of how sudden it was. There was no preamble, no build-up. One second he’s hungry and the next he’s being fed, it’s as simple as that. The satisfaction of it is so heady he almost feels mid-orgasm himself now, pleasure wracking his frame that’s greedy and selfish in nature.

There’s blood gushing around his fangs and filling his mouth so messily it’s obscene, a good portion of it immediately spilling past the corners of his lips and trailing down his chin in rivulets. It’s a terrible waste and if he had his wits about him more than he does, he might be upset about it. As it is, he’s too focused on what _ isn’t  _ escaping his mouth. He laps up and drinks down as much as he can, with a desperation that has him clawing at the wall behind her head and leaving indents in solid brick. 

Beyond his control, his hands slide down the brickwork and find their way to her hips. He grips them hard, leaves bruises in his wake, cuts into her skin with his nails and feels the wet blood well-up against his fingertips. He doesn’t look, doesn’t even dare to think about pulling away from her neck, but he can only imagine how good it looks as he slides his fingers through the mess and spreads the blood across her pale skin in trails. He pulls her body into his, seeks out her warmth, finds his hips subconsciously rolling into hers. It’s difficult to remember why he was trying to avoid this outcome.

He pulls off her neck, hastily trails his tongue across his fangs uncaring of whether he nicks it in the process because it’ll only immediately heal with so much fresh blood in his system. Once his fangs are thoroughly cleaned and glistening white again, he moves down her neck and plunges them into another vein. She gasps, entire body spasming against his. He smirks around the skin he’s biting down on.

All he can think about is getting more, at any cost. He’s reduced to a one track mind from the first drop on his tongue. He bites harder, sucks at her skin hard enough that it’s sure to leave bruises around the wounds left behind by his fangs. The flow of blood across his tongue is still so heavy he couldn’t hope to possibly drink it all without wasting, and still he’s determined to find a way to get more.

_ He’ll tear her apart if he has to, just like the last one. _

One of his wandering hands worms its way under the hem of her shirt, settles on the tender skin of her stomach. He feels so strong now, pure power radiating through his veins. It would take nothing, just a flex of his fingers, and the entirety of her blood could be  _ his _ .

But in the same instant he goes to make his move and gut her, her hand darts down and grips his wrist.

It causes him to pause for a moment, to wonder if she’s trying to protest and fight him off, but at this point he’s too far gone to do much more than consider. It’s not going to stop him even if she is. He knows what he wants, no one can get in the way of him drinking her dry. 

She isn’t pushing him away though, as much as using her grip on his wrist to pull him in closer. She squirms against the wall uselessly, but it doesn’t seem like a struggle, even though it has Lance begrudgingly following her every movement in an attempt to keep drinking. As it is, he has to unlatch and latch on again lower down toward her collarbone.

He has half a mind to force her still himself, which was his initial plan, but she finally seems to get whatever she was after because she goes still as a statue all of the sudden. So still it’s almost unnerving, has the fog of bloodlust clearing enough that he wonders if maybe he’s managed to kill her. He pauses actively drinking, concentrates his hearing to listen for her breath or her heartbeat.

Heartbeat’s still strong, but her breath has come to a pause for the past few seconds and he can’t make sense of it until-

“Coming! Fuck, I’m gonna… gonna come. Mmnh,  _ haahh _ , just like that. Don’t stop, please, please don’t-”

The breath she’d been holding inside bursts from her lips in the form of a moan, long and drawn-out, voice breaking midway through and dissolving into a series of pleased little whimpers. He tastes the pleasure in her blood, a spike of sweetness so intense that it’s almost  _ too much _ . He can only drink for a couple seconds more before it overwhelms him, has him pulling back and smacking his lips a few times to chase the taste.

Lance blinks a few times, his head feeling disoriented and foggy with pleasure. Eventually, he finds his vision focusing on his thigh, where it’s being clamped tight between two long smooth legs, the red bunched-up fabric of her mini skirt a stark contrast against the blue of his jeans. Gingerly, mindful of where she’s still panting and gasping for air, he slides his leg free.

There’s a noticeable dark wet spot on the top of his thigh, and it doesn’t exactly take much configuring to realize it lines up exactly with where her pussy had been rubbing against the fabric. 

His immediate reaction is guilt, thinking that he somehow pressured her into something sexual when that was his absolute last intention. But he’s… he’s pretty damn sure that his command couldn’t have been mistaken as this. This seems like something entirely of her own violation. Like she just… genuinely  _ enjoyed  _ the feeling of his fangs in her neck. Now, whether that’s a very specific kink of hers or another fun vampire perk no one thought to warn him about is up in the air.

It isn’t exactly helping his case now that the blood isn’t the only thing he’s capable of thinking or feeling, and he notices that he’s achingly hard himself. Looking at himself, he can see the dark stain in his own boxers, can see where the head of his cock is straining against the fabric and twitching against the cool night air. It’s more a guess than anything else, but with how tightly his balls are drawn up against his body and how sensitive he feels… he’s pretty sure he was on the verge of coming himself before she went and pulled him out of his trance.

Well, fuck.

That happened.

All of that.

Whatever, he can figure the rest out later, there’s only one thing that matters right now and that’s whether or not she’s going to be okay. He pulls himself back further, takes a step away from her to really clear his head and make sure the pull of the bloodlust isn’t influencing him any longer. Not that it seems like it is, now that he’s broken out of the spell he was under, he’s far more aware of a  _ different  _ sort-of lust. Holy shit, he is fucking horny. The kind of horny where in the thirty seconds he spends standing there running his eyes over her and trying to assess the damage, he catches his hand drifting downward like it has a mind of its own more than once.

A quick glance over and Lance decides that she definitely doesn’t look good (well, obviously she looks good, she looks fucked-out and horny as all get out, Lance can’t help but pat himself on the back for that one). She’s all bloody and bruised, barely able to hold her weight up without support, and definitely in danger of having lost too much blood to recover from (pat on the back rescinded, Lance, you fucking animal, look what you’ve done). 

Shit, shit, shit, what is he supposed to do right now. He can’t exactly give her a clap on the shoulder and tell her to walk it off. This is serious. He’s lucky he didn’t kill her, very lucky, but he could very well yet if she doesn’t get the treatment she needs. That girl needs a hospital.

“I’m gonna drive you to the hospital, okay?” He sighs, scrubbing a hand across his face and giving an unmanly little shriek at the redness it comes away smeared in. He’s definitely gotta start carrying wet wipes in his pocket or something, if this is gonna keep happening to him. Plaxum looks like she’s a walking murder victim too, how is he supposed to drop her off at a hospital looking like that?

She gives him a strange, lingering look.

“Um, do I know you?” She asks, eyebrows raised pointedly toward her hairline. His own words come back to haunt him and he groans. Yeah, he didn’t want her to remember him afterward, but he also told her not to worry about the blood loss when she clearly needs to. This mind control stuff is tricky, who would have guessed?

“No.” Lance offers her the most friendly smile he can, while his mouth dripping blood and his hard cock half hanging out of his undone pants. Talk about stranger danger, he’s surprised she isn’t running for the hills by now. What he would give to have literally anyone to turn to right now. “No, you don’t know me.”

“I don’t need to go to the hospital. I’m fine.” Plaxum says evenly, turning on her heel and beginning to walk away from him just like that. In a flash, Lance has caught up to her and clamped a hand over her mouth, concealing her shocked scream. He pulls her back against his chest while she attempts to fight him off, making no progress at all with how unsettlingly weak she is. He shushes her gently, supports her when her legs grow weak beneath her.

Finally, when she’s settled a bit, he moves around to look her in the eye again.

“Plaxum, you were attacked by a wild dog. You lost a lot of blood and you’re in danger. You should be worried, freaking out. You need to go to the hospital. Like, right now. Use your cell to call an ambulance and pay for it with this money I’m giving you. Now, forget you ever saw me.”

It seems to work, taking immediate effect. She looks down at herself and starts screaming bloody fucking murder, at which point Lance kicks his ass into gear and darts away from the scene. He scrambles backward and grabs onto the ladder of a nearby fire escape, climbing up with vampire speed. In seconds, someone comes running around the corner to help her. He watches as they call an ambulance. He knows that he should do the gentlemanly thing and wait around to see her off, make sure she gets into the hands of healthcare professionals safely. It’s just…

He’s still fucking hard. Achingly so. His erection hasn’t even flagged in the last couple of minutes, even now with the distance between them. He’s never taken viagra before, but he’s pretty sure this is what it would feel like if he overdosed on it. He’s so hard he feels like he could come from one stroke to his cock, and then maybe come again three more times back-to-back. Sure, that might not be physically possible as a human, but maybe being a vampire has given him super orgasms on top of everything else. 

How should he know? Up until this moment he hasn’t even _ tried  _ to get off.

Masturbating hasn’t exactly been at the top of his list of priorities since dying, believe it or not. He’s not some sex fiend, he’s just a normal guy, and normal guys generally struggle with their libido when they’re going through something traumatic or depressing. The few times he had found himself feeling some type of way since being turned, it’d been brought on by the smell of blood and the hunger-horny that accompanied that. And, at the time, he’d had enough human morality left to address that as the big pile of nope it was and force his hands under his legs, refusing to get off on such questionable terms.

Well, his past self would certainly be disappointed to see him now.

In the back of his mind, there’s still a voice of reason reminding him of the fact that he probably shouldn’t be doing this. The desire to is just much, much louder. It almost feels more like a need, as he kicks his jeans down his legs the rest of the way and chucks them behind himself. He pauses then, hesitates for a long moment and wonders if he’s really so depraved that he’s going to get off on a rooftop covered in another person’s blood. That feels like crossing a line that he can’t come back from.

His cock blurts another bead of pre-cum where it’s straining against thin black fabric and Lance’s heightened vision watches as the wet spot in his underwear grows the slightest bit wider. He licks his lips, tastes the lingering blood still clinging to his skin, lets his eyelids flutter shut as he savours it. He counts the seconds, wills his erection to go away so he doesn’t have to do what he’s about to do. He lasts a whopping fifteen seconds before caving.

Fuck it. He’ll debate the morality later, right now he just wants to get off.

From the very moment he makes up his mind that he’s going to do it, everything starts happening so fast he can hardly keep up. He shoves a hand into his underwear and wraps his fingers around himself, and right from the start his pace is brutal. He fists his cock so feverishly that it almost hurts, using the full extent of his vampire speed to run his hand over himself from base to tip. 

It’s heavenly, has him throwing his head back against the roof and not even feeling the corresponding jolt of pain. The pleasure is too intense to feel anything else.

The heat pooling southward is amounting too fast, causing his entire body to tense up in preparation for the orgasm of a lifetime. But he’s always been a glutton for punishment, loves to make himself wait for it, and apparently that’s one thing that hasn’t changed. He grits his teeth hard, forces himself to slow the pace of his hand and come back from the edge. The moan that tears its way from his throat is broken and pained, as his eyebrows draw together and he staves off the last of the shocks of pleasure threatening to become something more.

From then on, he simply holds his hand steady and lets his hips do the work, hoping that’ll help him pace himself better. He lies there with his back bowed into a beautiful arch, flexing and thrusting clumsily into his grip. He looks down the length of his body, bites down hard against his lip as he admires the drying blood painted across his tan skin. Curiously, he lets go of himself and instead grabs at the waistband of his boxers, pushing them down harshly.

His cock springs to attention immediately, long and curved up toward his navel, and he watches idly as a drop of pre-cum falls to his stomach. There’s a damning tint of red to the length of his cock, and oh it’s definitely sick of him to be getting off with a hand still covered in blood, but he can’t tear his eyes away from the sight. He’s absolutely fascinated, as he spreads his fingers out and taps his cock against his palm, admiring the backdrop of red. He’s sick. Definitely fucked in the head. But oh god, is he ever horny, and somehow he isn’t disgusted with himself enough to stop.

He brings his hand up and with a sheepish glance around, spits into his palm. He brings it back down to his cock, rubs his saliva across where the blood had been drying and watches it start to glisten a more vivid red again. He can’t stop himself then, he tugs at his cock hungrily, pulls the foreskin back and rubs his thumb against the head with enough pressure to have his legs kicking out and collapsing beneath him. The pain is gone as soon as it’s there, mixes in with the pleasure to make a delicious cocktail he can’t get enough of.

He’s gonna come, he can feel it building, the tension ready to snap like a worn elastic. He squeezes his cock, milks out a few more beads of pre-cum and quickly swipes them down the shaft to ease the way of his fist. He’s trying and failing not to make any noise, little grunts of approval punched out of his chest each time his hand collides with the base of his cock and he flicks his wrist against it.

He’s gonna let himself have it this time, as his cock twitches tellingly in his hand, ready to spill.

His fangs sink down from his gums again in the same instant the first jet of cum shoots across his abdomen. He whines, biting down on his lip hard enough that they sink into the flesh again, but he doesn’t care. The added sensation of thick blood sliding across his tongue only makes it more intense.

It’s good. So fucking good. Better maybe than it’s ever been. 

It seems to go on forever, as he lays there and halfheartedly writhes up against his hand. His grip has grown lazy and loose, but he refuses to give up on the last bits of pleasure he can wring out of himself, so he keeps his hips thrusting as long as he can stand it. The amount of cum is ridiculous too, a stark contrast of white against a faded bloody red where it paints his stomach in streaks. 

As he starts to come down, he uses his free hand to trail his fingers through the mess. He chuckles lazily to himself. It’s still sort-of disgusting. It also still has him blurting a final glob of cum, one that slides halfway down his cock before hitting his knuckles. 

Completely spent, he wipes his hands on his poor shirt and simply drops his head to the ground beneath him. He feels hazy and relaxed, and that’s not exactly a common feeling to him anymore, so he chooses to bask in it and worry about what he’s done later. Now that he’s looking up, he can admire all the stars littering the sky above him. They’re more vivid and visible than he’s ever seen them, with his eyes so sensitive to light and movement. It almost feels like he’s right there, like they’re within his reach.

Suddenly, he comes back to himself enough to realize that he’s a walking biohazard right now, a mix of cum and blood covering the better half of his entire body. Yep, okay, moment ruined. He needs a shower.

As he’s putting his clothes back on, he grabs his phone and finds a couple texts waiting for him there.

One is from his boss, Allura, and she’s reminding him that his vacation days have officially run out. She says she looks forward to seeing him at work again tomorrow, and that everyone at the office has missed him dearly. He smiles to himself, but it’s a fragile sort-of smile. He’s still not sure if he can go back to work, as much as he misses it just as much.

The second text is… well, it’s from Keith, sent in the last hour… but it’s incredibly cryptic in nature. 

_ From: Keith. Sent: 1:34am _

_ “Well, I hope you’re happy. That makes one of us.” _

Call Lance crazy, but he gets the impression that the sentiment isn’t  _ entirely  _ genuine and Keith maybe does not want him to be happy right now.

He has to physically stop himself from typing out a response impulsively and breaking his vow of silence of the last two weeks. The vagueness of the text is killing him, he needs to know what Keith means by that. There’s so much venom there, so much hurt. It’s eating him up inside, not knowing exactly where Keith is coming from. But he can’t just ask, can’t reach out only when it’s convenient to him.

When he lets himself back into Keith’s life…  _ if _ … he wants to be sure it’s a permanent thing.

He waits to see if Keith will text him again with any sort-of explanation, but all he gets is a whole lot of radio silence for a good ten minutes. At which point, he gives up and finishes dressing himself. He’ll head home and clean himself up like he planned to, though he’s far more distracted than before. His heart isn’t in anything he does, it’s somewhere on the other side of the city, wherever Keith is.

Good thing Lance has a long sleepless night ahead of him to debate the meaning of that text, whether he’s going back to work or not, and the morality of what he’s just done! By golly, he sure looks forward to that mental torture he’s going to put himself through!

\--

Lance still hasn’t fully made up his mind on whether he’s going to work or not that next morning. He feels conflicted for a myriad of different reasons. He still has dried blood under his fingernails, for fuck’s sake, what kind of menace would he be to go out into public and act like nothing is wrong with him? But, on the other hand, he had controlled himself last night. He’d only taken blood from one source, and she had walked away afterward without even needing any help. He’s making the formal decision to not even think about what happened after the blood drinking, that lapse in judgment does not count.

And he really loves his job. He worked so hard to get where he is, he cares about all of his coworkers, his boss loves him and has even hinted at a possible raise in the future. It would be a damn shame to give all that up now. Besides, he’s probably worked with worse people in the past without even realizing it. He had a couple coworkers at his highschool job at McDonald’s that were most fucking definitely murderers.

What is he thinking?!

He can’t risk putting those coworkers he cares about so much in harm’s way. What if someone was to nick their finger in the office? Or, hell, not to get crude here but 90% of his coworkers are people that have periods and is he gonna be like a shark in the water where any scent of blood at all sets him off? He doesn’t know! That’s the thing, he doesn’t know what he is and isn’t capable of controlling about this. 

And he won’t know until he slips up and finds out the hard way.

But what is he meant to do with his time if he can’t work, can’t sleep, can’t eat, can’t socialize, can’t play games or watch tv? If this is what immortality is gonna be like for the rest of time, then you can count him out of it, because it fucking sucks. It’s like the end tail of summer vacation when you almost look forward to the normalcy of going back to school because at least then you have something to do with your time.

Lance is bored.

So, so bored.

It’s nearing 6am and he still has three more hours to debate whether he wants to take the risk of going to work or not. He’d never forgiven himself if he harmed someone he cares about. Don’t get him started about how guilty he feels about last night now. Hell, even Laura is still upsetting him. He’s been keeping an eye on the news for any information, but so far it’s been completely barren. He hopes that her kids weren’t terribly upset.

He stretches out across his couch, until his head is hanging over the arm rest and he’s eyeing his apartment from an upside-down view. Anything to try and pinpoint something new to dedicate his time and attention to. He could read a book, maybe, if he has the focus for it. He has a solid twenty or so that he’s bought and never gotten around to yet. Maybe… if he really forces himself to…

His phone goes off and he crosses the apartment in a split second, slamming his hand down on the counter so unintentionally hard that it leaves a crack in the plaster. Woops. He really needs to get a handle on that, needs to figure out how strong he actually is so he stops underestimating himself.

Wait a minute… isn’t  _ that  _ a thought of how to spend his time. It’ll be like all of those montages in superhero movies where they explore their newfound superpowers for the first time. Sure, Lance’s come at the expense of his mortality and his life as he knows it, but they’re still sort-of superpowers in their own right.

But then he distractedly glances the first few words of the text he’s been sent and he immediately forgets all about the idea. He falls into one of the stools around the kitchen island, eyes wide as saucers as he ever-so-carefully opens the text with his cracked touch screen. He finds himself holding his breath, like even the slightest startle might cause the text to disappear.

_ From: Keith. Sent: 6:01am _

_ “Maybe things were different for you, but you were more than just a client to me. I really enjoyed our time together and I considered you to be a friend. Lance, as a friend, I’m worried about you. At least have the decency to fill me in and be honest with me.” _

Oh God. 

There’s really no beating around the bush to that message, is there? There’s the blunt and honest Keith that Lance knows and loves, but with a newfound level of emotion that he’s always seemed to repress before. This goes a little deeper than surface level opinions and banter like they normally talk about, and Lance would be a fool to take that for granted and not see how heavy it really is.

The message itself is short and simple, but it’s what’s being said without words that rings out louder than anything else. What exactly being worried about Lance means, and how heavily it must be bothering Keith for him to mention it at all. It isn’t something he’s thinking about in passing and thought he’d shoot a quick text off, this is something sitting heavy with him, something he’s been dwelling on.

Lance can’t keep ignoring him. Can’t keep willing the problem to go away on its own, for Keith to move on and give up just like that. Hell, the last thing he wants is for Keith to actually stop caring about him, even if he’s doing a shit job of preventing it. He needs to say something, even if it isn’t the right thing.

_ To: Keith. Sent: 6:10am _

_ “Hey man, sorry I haven’t gotten back to you. Super busy with work and family stuff. Hard to explain so maybe we’ll catch up over coffee sometime. I’ll be back at the gym before you know it though, I was just starting to be able to see my six pack and I can’t pass on that. Cheers.” _

It leaves a little something to be desired, it’s blatantly a message typed-out without much thought thrown into it and then promptly sent without being looked over. It’s not necessarily a lie, or at least not one that Keith can call him out on anyway, given he doesn’t know a damn thing about Lance’s family or work life beyond what he’s been told. It should work, it should be enough to tide him over until Lance has a better grasp on all of this and he can-

Not even twenty seconds pass before another text comes in.

Keith never replies that fast. Holy shit.

_ From: Keith. Sent: 6:10am _

_ “Friday?” _

Panic mode: activated. That’s a whole lot of pressure and commitment for a guy who isn’t even entirely sure he can go back to his job ever again. Nevermind that he’s never once hung-out with Keith outside of their time together at the gym, despite the invitation to come up to his apartment the last time they’d seen each other. This would be a big first for them. Getting coffee together… that sounds kind of suspiciously close to possibly being a date. If Lance squints a little and lets his hope run wild, he can almost convince himself that that’s all this is. Keith asking him out, finally.

But there’s more to it than that and he knows it. Keith is just doing whatever he can to try and bridge the gap Lance has wedged between them. He’s going out on a limb here not out of desire, but out of desperation. It’s not a date, not the kind Lance wants it to be.

He plays it dumb, stalls for more time to debate.

_ To: Keith. Sent: 6:12am _

_ “What?” _

Except, his stall does him no good, because Keith just charges ahead with the typical lack of finesse.

_ From: Keith. Sent: 6:13am _

_ “This Friday. Let’s do coffee. Name a time and place that works for you. I’m training a new guy at the gym so I can take time off if I have to.” _

Keith is being so forward about it, the pressure is definitely on. Nevermind that he’s willing to take off work for it? That’s unheard of. Keith Kogane never takes off work for fucking anything, being a workaholic is his most defining personality trait. He literally lives above the gym and Lance is pretty sure it’s just so he never has to have it out of his sight. His business is his pride and joy. 

He must be pretty serious about this, then.

_ From: Keith. Sent: 6:14am _

_ “Unless you’re back in Cuba for the family stuff?” _

There it is! Lance’s out. The perfect excuse, the perfect opportunity, the perfect lie that Keith would clearly actually believe if it’s where his mind naturally led him anyway. It makes sense that Lance would take time off work and go back home if something came up in the family. It’s the one possible excuse where he wouldn’t be to blame for not coming to the gym all this time and not giving a good reason for it, if it’s something personal and devastating within the family. Sure, that’s shitty to lie about, but it’s not like telling the truth is even an option for him now.

_ To: Keith. Sent: 6:15am _

_ “Yeah, sorry. I had to come home a couple weeks ago. Family health scare.” _

Good, good, good. Everything’s going to plan. 

Keith’s response doesn’t immediately come this time. It’s odd how quickly Lance has gotten used to it, gotten greedy with it, spoiled even. He always wants Keith’s undivided attention, to think that he’s going about his morning routine and periodically dropping everything to get back to Lance is ridiculously endearing. He can picture Keith half-dressed, hair sticking up in every which direction, a toothbrush hanging from the corner of his lips as his fingers rapidly fly across his phone to respond. Adorable.

Lance catches himself smiling at the thought before he can help it.

The sad truth is, no matter how much Lance kids himself, he knows that it’s only a matter of time before his self-control cracks and he gives up on distancing himself. He’s a people-person, he always has been, he can’t live his life alone and abandon the people he loves. Keith included.

So, he has to find a solution. He’ll have to do whatever it takes to test himself, to build-up a resistance, to prepare for every possible scenario. He can be a vampire and still be a friend, a son, a brother, a lover. It doesn’t matter if the concept is a contradiction in itself, he’s been a walking contradiction his entire life. 

Mind made up and optimism restored, Lance lets himself begin to hope.

He can do this. If anyone can figure out a way to navigate all of this, it’s him. He’s been through the impossible before, has worked so damn hard to make his life into what it is today, he won’t give all of that up without a fight. And he certainly isn’t willing to give Keith up, he’ll do whatever it takes.

Lance’s phone buzzes and he looks down, his wide smile faltering. And then it’s crumpling, falling apart like the shambles of his life as of late, turning inward and collapsing into something much, much smaller.

_ From: Keith. Sent: 6:34am _

_ “You know, it’s weird, I could’ve sworn I saw you leaving a club last night. The resemblance was uncanny, the guy looked just like you, even had the same shirt I’ve seen you wearing on Insta. But you’re in Cuba, so it couldn’t have been. Right, Lance?” _

_ Right, Lance? _

_ God, Lance, what kind of fool do you take me for? _

_ Fuck you, Lance. _

Keith doesn’t have to say it, Lance can read between the lines enough to pick up on exactly what he’s putting down. The call-out is an obvious one, there’s no room for argument here. Lance had been caught dead in his web of lies. And if there’s one thing he knows without a fraction of a doubt when it comes to Keith, it’s that he doesn’t appreciate mind-games or being played with. 

He didn’t mention anything about Plaxum, didn’t have to. Lance knows that he must have seen her, is choosing not to make it about that and instead focusing on the lie itself. There’s no way he isn’t jumping to conclusions about Lance sleeping around with random girls while leaving Keith on read for weeks on end. There’s no way that doesn’t feel like the massive fucking slap in the face that it must seem like from Keith’s perspective.

How the hell does Lance even begin to come back from this?

“Fuck!” Lance snarls, anger flaring suddenly. He curls his hand into a fist and suddenly what had once been a phone in his hand, is a pile of glass, shards of metal, and an exposed circuit board. “Fucking fuck!”

\--

Lance goes to work that day, after spending a couple hours reigning in his emotions and getting a grip on his self-control. He dresses in his nicest suit and walks into the office like nothing is wrong. Everyone believes him, they don’t see through the act at all. And the more he settles into his old routine, the easier it gets for him to ignore as well.

Sure, it likely has a lot to do with the fact he’d fed just the night before, but the point is… the thudding of heartbeats and the aromatic smell of blood all around him isn’t enough to distract him completely. He can still go about his daily routine how he used to, do paperwork and email back his clients, work on his next advertising pitch. 

He can still have his life back, it’s just a little bit harder than it used to be. Nothing he can’t handle.

He can do this. If he starts here, then it’ll only be a matter of time before he can really go back to the gym and fix things with Keith. But he has to build up to that, make absolutely sure that he’s not making a mistake in letting himself back into Keith’s life. He won’t walk out on him twice.

\--

Another week passes.

Lance goes to work like normal, finds himself having those fang-incidents less and less, and can pinpoint the exact moment he needs to feed again. It’s when he catches himself hesitating in the break room, distracted by the scent of the maintenance man’s blood. Immediately, he claims to be sick and heads home for the day to start planning his next feeding.

Later that night he’s found his next victim (victim seems like the wrong word? Maybe he should call them  _ snaccs _ ). The next _ person  _ he feeds from, is a scrawny college student that he finds in the bathroom of a Walmart. He’s actually there to pick up bleach and rubber gloves, among other things that he’s probably going to need a steady supply of if he keeps up this cannibalism shit. Anyway, he’s not at Walmart to find his next lunch, because that’d be the worst place to go looking for food. Have you seen the type of people that frequent a Walmart? Yeah, Lance has some standards for whose blood he gargles in the back of his throat, thanks. He’s not trying to catch any diseases. You know, aside from when he jacked off using blood as lube… that might have been asking for diseases.

Anyway, point is, Lance didn’t fucking go to Walmart to feed.

But when he walks into the bathroom to check on his appearance, to make sure his blue eyes aren’t starting to look too red to be passable as human, he catches a whiff of the guy. And hoo boy, is it ever a whiff. This guy is fucking zazzed, he’s mid-orgasm or some shit, he’s hornier than Lance had been during that questionable little tryst in an alleyway. 

Of all the places to be unreasonably horny… the Walmart bathroom is certainly a unique choice.

And well, Lance is curious, and maybe a hungry now if the appearance of his fangs is anything to go by.

Maybe he uses his vampire super-speed to slide under the stall in one smooth glide, pops up onto his knees between the guy’s widespread legs. He’s sitting on the toilet with his phone in hand, jerking it to some tentacle porn, headphones covering his ears so thoroughly that it takes him a second to notice Lance’s presence in the stall. At which point, yeah, he screams a little.

Lance is quick to silence him, a snarl ripping out of his throat as he clamps a hand over the man’s mouth and shoves the headphones from his head. They make eye contact, the poor stranger looking like he’s about to piss himself, with eyes as wide as saucers. Lance smiles at him.

“You’re going to let me bite you.” Lance says evenly, curling his fingers around the guy’s mouth, pressing them into his cheeks and watching his lips purse like a fish. Slowly, the man nods a few times, readjusts himself on the toilet. Lance glances down, gives his cock a quick disinterested once-over and sees that it’s already softening, that he’s already come. Lance is almost relieved, he really wants to keep this from venturing into sexy territory if he can. He looks back to the man’s eyes. “It won’t hurt. You won’t feel any pain at all. In fact, you won’t feel any pleasure from it either, so don’t get any ideas, horny Walmart bathroom guy. Keep it in your pants. You just came, you’re not ready for another rodeo.”

Lance says, even as he feels his cock fill out in the confines of his jeans. Whatever.

And then, like a dedicated worshipper of a god, reverent and thankful… Lance surges forward and bites into the flesh of a surprisingly hairless thigh. Okay, maybe it’s less reverent and more vicious, if he’s being honest. He feeds hungrily and selfishly, slurping down as much blood as he can. The angle is actually a little better this time, doesn’t leave him wasting nearly as much. He also doesn’t feel like he  _ needs  _ as much… and he’s pretty sure, as much as he doesn’t want to admit it, that has something to do with the sickeningly-sweet and satisfying taste of sex in the guy’s blood.

It’s good, don’t get him wrong, but it’s the same idea as eating nothing but cake the day after your birthday. It’s delicious, leaves you satisfied and full for a while, but there’s a limit to how much of that shit you can actually eat before it makes you sick. It’s the same reason he’d been able to stop himself before he drank Plaxum dry, because her blood had taken on that overwhelming taste after she… you know, busted a nut all over his thigh or whatever.

Is he… supposed to make his victims orgasm? Is that part of the vampire feeding process?

This is some Twilight shit, he’s gonna file a complaint with whoever decided that was a good idea.

Still, he can’t deny that this time around… everything is surprisingly easy. It’s manageable. He drinks until he’s comfortably full and no more than that, then he doesn’t even hesitate to pull back and retract his fangs from the man’s leg. He licks each fang clean, then he even pauses to lick the guy’s wound and make sure there’s no blood smeared across his skin.

Wound. A singular wound. Lance didn’t even have to bite him twice.

Aside from the fact Lance has another boner from hell that he’s sure won’t go away until he gets off… it all seems a little bit too easy. He pulls back and sits on his haunches between the guy’s legs, furrowing his eyebrows together and thinking. He won’t know for sure until he has a few more experiences, tries it a couple different ways. This surely seems like a credible theory though.

“Forget you ever saw me. Forget that I bit you. Don’t question the marks on your leg.” Lance tells him in an almost robotic voice, lacking any emotions when his thoughts are so far away. He rises to his feet, takes note of how scuzzy the tiles of the floor are and resists the urge to gag. The man is looking at him a little weirdly now, probably because he doesn’t remember who Lance is or how he got into the stall with him. Lance raises an eyebrow at him. “Get up and go home now.”

And just like that, the guy gathers his things and slips them into his bag, pulls his pants up and covers the wound with no problems, and then he excuses himself from the room. He doesn’t even really seem weak as he walks away, humming a song under his breath as he washes his hands in the sink. It’s… a hell of a lot simpler than the last time, and definitely the time before that.

Once he’s gone, Lance plops himself down on the same toilet and pulls his cock out through his fly. He gets himself off almost begrudgingly at first, though it’s hard to keep scowling when he’s experiencing pleasure stronger than anything he ever felt as a human. He squirms up into his touch, chases the feeling, licks his lips to savour the last few traces of blood… and then, inevitably, he comes all over himself in the same instant a stranger walks into the room to use it for its intended purpose.

Now _ Lance  _ has become the Walmart bathroom pervert.

He finds a way to reach new lows every single day, doesn’t he?

\--

Keith hasn’t messaged him since that call-out a week ago. It’s bothering Lance a lot more than he cares to admit, sitting heavy in his gut throughout every hour of the day and night. The guilt is eating him alive, and only getting worse when he subjects himself to the torture of reading back through their texts every night. He can’t help it, he misses Keith desperately, even more now that his life has gone back to normal in almost every other way. It just feels like Keith should be here, should be a part of his routine again. 

He thinks about Keith while he’s at work, sitting in a cramped office cubicle and going over paperwork.

He thinks about Keith while he’s lounging across Hunk’s couch, after finally giving in and texting back his best friend. Hunk doesn’t even ask any hard questions about why Lance has been so distant, just welcomes him back with open arms and lets him rant about how much he misses Keith.

He thinks about Keith while he’s jogging around the neighborhood each morning, trying to work off some of the excess energy and do something with all of the spare time he has.

He thinks about Keith while he’s meticulously planning out his next feeding to make sure it goes smoothly, jotting down notes in a notepad that sort-of look like the scribblings of a mad man. 

He even thinks about Keith when he’s browsing through his long forgotten Tinder account, stretched out stark-naked in bed with his fangs toying with his bottom lip.

Okay, come to think of it, now probably isn’t the best time to be thinking of Keith. Not that he can train himself to stop or anything, but how the hell is he meant to find any of these people even remotely sexually attractive when Keith is on his mind?! He’s setting himself up for disappointment here. His heart is far from in it as he mindlessly flicks through profiles.

Which leads us to why he’s on Tinder for the first time in months anyway.

After last week’s encounter in the Walmart bathroom, he’s been curious to test some things out. If his running theory is correct and sex is the part of the equation that he’s been missing when it comes to feeding, then he wants to  _ know _ . It would make things simultaneously easier and harder, because on the one hand it would mean no risk of murder, but on the other hand it would bring emotions into play that he doesn’t want to associate with drinking blood.

He isn’t about to brainwash anyone into having sex with him though, that’s an entirely different ballpark of gross from what he has been doing. Other than maybe the murder, that was maybe in the same ballpark of gross. Ugh, whatever, the point is, he has morals and he’s going to keep trying his damndest to cling onto them no matter what life throws his way.

So, he has to charm his way into the sexual good graces of another person the wholesome, 100% organic, and natural way that he always has before. You know, years ago, when he used to actually be good at this picking up people in clubs and arranging hook-ups over dating apps stuff. It’s a lot harder to navigate than he remembers and he’s pretty sure his struggle is only half to do with the fact that none of the people on his screen are Keith.

He misses Keith  _ so  _ much. He hasn’t seen him in an entire  _ month _ as of today.

He doesn’t want any of these people, not like he wants Keith.

Sure, it was easy in the heat of the moment, when he was feeding and already hard. He could just go along with baser instincts. But now, without the smell of heavy blood in his nostrils spurring him on, he has to actually think and make a conscious decision to do this. And the truth of the matter is… he doesn’t want to. He doesn’t want to have sex with a stranger almost as much as he doesn’t want to murder a stranger. Neither are preferable options.

Maybe they don’t have to go all the way, maybe he can just do more of what he has been and initiate a little mutual jerk-off session while he feeds. That’s fine. It’s still not something he wants to do, though.

What he wants to do… now that’s a thought to think about. He would give anything to be able to go to the gym right now, to confidently stroll up to Keith’s door and sweep Keith off his feet. He would lay the charm on thick, apologize genuinely for everything he’s done, would initiate that kiss he’s been meaning to get around to for weeks. And then, assuming all went well, Keith would invite him inside and one thing would lead to another. 

Now more than ever, he knows he would give any fucking thing to have Keith all to himself. To have him underneath him, spread out against the mattress, his dark hair fanning across the pillow, all of that naked pale flesh bared to him in earnest, his to touch and to cherish. Lance would take his sweet fucking time getting Keith off, make no mistake about that. He wouldn’t even bring feeding into the occasion until he’d already made Keith come at least once, maybe even more than once.

Great, now he’s horny and  _ sad _ . And no closer to finding someone to spend the night with.

He could…

No, no he couldn’t.

Well…  _ maybe _ …

Lance is starting to learn that impulse control doesn’t really exist to a vampire that’s both hungry and horny, especially not one that’s always had pretty shit impulse control from the start when it comes to what he wants most. He’s fighting a losing battle. He keeps telling himself it’s a bad idea, but he’s also on his feet and pulling clothes onto his naked frame in record time. 

It couldn’t hurt, right? He’s a little hungry, but nothing like he’d been the night that he’d murdered poor Laura and lost control of himself. He’s still in his right mind. His eyes aren’t even red yet, only sporting the slightest of purple hues. It’s not like he’s going into this fully expecting Keith to sleep with him either, he just wants to see him again, that’s all. Maybe, if he’s lucky, they can start to piece things back together between them.

He walks to the gym rather than taking a cab, wants to give himself plenty of time to test his limits long before he’s got Keith standing in front of him and at risk. He passes by crowds of people in the street on his walk, inhales deeply. The scent of their blood is strong and appealing, but not something that he can’t resist and walk away from. He purposely presses close to strangers on the sidewalk, making absolutely sure that he isn’t going to snap and turn on Keith. He’d never forgive himself.

In an hour’s time, he finds himself standing at the bottom of the steps and looking up at the familiar building looming in front of him. It’s exactly how he remembered it. 

Drawing a heavy steadying breath and preparing himself for what lies ahead, he walks up the steps one by one. He comes to a stop in front of the door, steeling his expression into something determined and raising his fist to knock… and then he hears voices on the other side of the door. Loud, angry voices. One is Keith’s, which sends his poor dead heart fluttering. The other is… not someone that Lance recognizes.

But oh, Keith seems to recognize him, speaks to him like someone he’s known a lifetime and hated every single second of it. There is something vicious about the way they’re shouting at each other.

“Fuck you!”

“Fuck  _ you _ !”

“God, why do you always have to be like this?! You’re such a possessive piece of sh-”

“You asked for this, Keith! You said you wanted me back! You don’t get to go back and forth whenever it’s convenient to you! Just because I’m not who you want me to be doesn’t mean I’m not worthy of a little respect, you know? I have feelings too, you can’t keep stringing me along like this!”

Lance blinks a few times as he eavesdrops on the conversation. It isn’t even fully intentional, he’s not standing there with his ear pressed to the door or anything. His hearing is just that heightened that he can hear their shouting from here, despite the fact they’re still on the second floor. They’re growing closer though, Lance realizes as the squabble continues.

In an instant, he scrambles away from the door, hurrying back down the steps and ducking into the shadows of the alley beside the building. He lurks there, gaze glued to the doors when they fly open short seconds later. The stranger walks outside first, a short man wearing a beanie over his brown hair, looking otherworldly levels of pissed off.

“I’m not going anywhere!” The man announces loudly, even as he stumbles down the stairs and whips around to glare back into the gym, presumably at Keith. Lance finds himself creeping forward before he can help himself, eyes wide and hopeful. He just wants to see Keith. For even a second.

“Get out, Rolo, I’m serious! I’ll call the cops on you again if I have to!” Keith snarls back at him, voice so heavy with emotion that it seems to waver. It has Lance flinching backward, the sheer amount of venom behind the words. He’s never heard Keith sound like that. He wonders if this is how mad Keith was at him the night that he saw him leaving the club with Plaxum. Maybe Lance deserves the same treatment this Rolo guy is getting, but he’d just been too cowardly to show up and  _ let  _ Keith be mad.

Lance’s worries are quickly forgotten though, mind going blissfully and wonderfully blank when Keith  _ finally _ steps through the doors and into his line of sight.

Keith is everything Lance remembered him being and  _ more _ . Of course nothing has changed, but at the same time  _ everything _ has changed. Lance feels like he’s looking at him in a new light, with heightened senses and a heart that’s been missing him for an entire month. 

He’s a  _ vision _ . The most beautiful man Lance has ever laid eyes on. 

Keith is standing there in nothing but a pair of faded grey jogging pants, one hand on his hip as he looms menacingly over the stairs and holds an umbrella as if it were a weapon. He’s barefoot in mid-December with frost melting between his toes, unwashed greasy hair pulled back from his face with a backward snapback, and he looks so mad that he might very well burst blood vessels in his forehead if he keeps it up. His eyes are fiery and bright, shining a deep amethyst color in the moonlight as he flies into Rolo so passionately that Lance can see spittle flying from his lips.

Yep. That’s the one. That’s Lance’s soulmate.

God, is it ever good to be  _ home _ .

“Come on,  _ Keith _ , what happened to wanting to get back together?”

“I sobered up and remembered what a douchebag you are!” Keith is just as furious as before, but Lance’s gaze can’t help but drift down to his feet, where he’s jumping from one foot to the other to stave off the oncoming frostbite. It’s unreasonably cute and stupid alike, and Lance wants nothing more than to step out of the shadows and lead Keith back into the warmth of the gym. Unfortunately, now really does not seem like the time to try and make amends, so he’s forced to watch from the sidelines.

“Who pissed in your Cheerios today?!” Rolo hisses. “You look like crap, for the record. I was willing to be generous and sleep with you for your sake, because you look like you need a good pick me up, but fuck that. I’m not gonna hold back if you’re not.”

“Oh? Is that so?” Keith’s voice has gone quiet now, but it’s almost scarier that way. There’s something going on with his eyes that makes him look downright murderous. Lance would hate to be on the receiving end of that look. He hopes he never has to be.

“Get a haircut, you look like a mop!” Rolo accuses, pointing a finger at Keith. Keith doesn’t even flinch, shows no outward reaction at all. Slowly, he offers a strained smile, it’s crooked and wrong in every way, doesn’t fit on his face properly. The bitterness is tangible.

“Thanks. I’ll take it into consideration.”

“Yeah? You’d better.” Rolo flounders a bit at the utter lack of reaction his words garnered. He picks himself back up quick though, before Keith uses the in to drag him through the dirt any harder. “By the way, when was the last time your sweaty ass had a shower?! You smell like shit!”

Weirdly, this is the insult that has Keith pausing. He stands there staring at Rolo for a long moment, lips pursed like he has something more to say. Ultimately, he simply closes them though, letting himself stand there tight-lipped and pondering as he rakes his eyes over Rolo’s disheveled frame. He lets out a long sigh suddenly, stepping backward into the warmth of the gym.

Lance takes a risk, steps out of the shadows the slightest bit so he can keep his eyes on Keith.

“Are we really gonna do this? We’re gonna stand here in the street and insult each other? Jesus, Rolo, just go home. I’m not trying to relive the tail end of our failed relationship. I don’t care enough to go through this a second time around.” Now that the anger has dissipated, all that’s left behind is something empty and hollow. Lance had been so busy admiring, he hadn’t really seen the full picture even with his improved eyesight. Because Keith looks… he looks bad. He looks sickly skinny, dark under the eyes, with pale chapped lips. He looks exhausted. He looks more dead than Lance does.

Rolo seems to notice this at the exact same time.

It’s hard not to, as Keith’s shoulders slump and he leans into the doorframe for support.

“What’s wrong with you anyway? You sick or something?”

“Rolo, please go home.” Suddenly, Keith isn’t demanding. He’s begging. His voice cracks a little with the request, his eyes going wide as he looks hopefully toward Rolo. There’s a silent plea there to just drop it, to leave it be and walk away. Keith doesn’t have the energy to continue. 

Rolo doesn’t seem like the type to back down though, and this is only confirmed when he steps closer and tries to head back up the steps to Keith instead of leaving. Keith tenses up as he approaches. “Look, you wanna know what’s wrong with me? I’ve just been  _ super  _ busy wallowing in my own misery from being rejected, and I haven’t had time to bathe. Now please, leave me alone.”

“Oh, here we go again.” Rolo rolls his eyes, whistling low under his breath as he steps up to Keith with a shit-eating grin. Even before he speaks, Lance knows it’s going to be a low blow. “The depressed emo pity me thing might have worked when we were teenagers, but you’re like twenty-eight now. You’re not mysterious and edgy anymore, Keith, you’re just whiny and pathetic. Grow up and realize that the world doesn’t owe y-”

There’s a distinct crunching noise when Keith’s fist collides with his nose.

Lance smells the blood in the air and gasps around the feeling of his fangs sliding down.

“Eat shit, Rolo.” Keith states plainly, turning on his heel and walking back into the gym. He slams the doors behind himself and it echoes through the night air. Rolo stands there gaping for a solid three seconds before groaning in pain. He reaches up and cups his nose, panic in his eyes when blood trickles down between his fingers. Lance catches himself smiling, a sick sense of satisfaction growing as his eyes zero in on it.

This is going to be fun.

He doesn’t pounce immediately, instead he stalks in silence behind Rolo as he walks down the road toward his car. Lance lets him grow comfortable, listens to him curse under his breath, watches him swipe the sleeve of his coat across the blood growing on his face in a halfhearted attempt to clean himself up. It’s useless, his nose is still actively bleeding, Lance can smell how fresh it is.

The time to strike presents itself to him when Rolo goes to unlock his car and the keys slip through his bloodied fingers. They land in the curbside snow, red bleeding into the clean white. Rolo bends down to retrieve his keys, and in a flash Lance bodychecks him into the side of his car hard enough to leave a dent in the exterior. Rolo cries out in pain and shock alike.

“I’m gonna make you regret ever being born.” Lance laughs wickedly, bloodlust building now that he’s closer and can smell it so vividly. He digs his fingers into Rolo’s hair underneath the hat, yanking him upright and then pinning him to the side of the car. He struggles uselessly. Lance doesn’t even give him the reprieve of using his compulsion to calm him down. He wants him fighting and screaming, the whole time if he can.

“Who the hell are y-” Lance doesn’t wait for him to finish the question. He dives forward and buries his face into the curve of Rolo’s neck, baring his fangs to make sure he can feel them pressed to his skin before the bite itself comes. A taunting precursor for what’s to come. He’s gonna paint the entire side of this stupid Prius with red, gonna-

Lance freezes.

Closes his mouth.

Takes another deep inhale where his nose is pressed to the other man’s jaw.

“You smell like him.” Lance whispers, voice soft with awe. He presses his face more insistently into the curve of Rolo’s neck, sniffs him like a dog would and basks in his favorite scent. He hasn’t seen Keith since being turned, but he’d remember that particular combination of sweat and bodywash and _ Keith _ anywhere, especially now that it’s so much more intense for him. God, he could fucking suffocate in it.

“W-What? _ Who _ ? What the hell is wrong with you?!” Rolo grunts, trying to wiggle out of Lance’s grip with all his strength. Lance growls low in his throat and Rolo immediately stills, tensing up from head to toe.

“Listen to me, jackass.” Lance gets a grip on Rolo’s shoulders and whips him around, so they’re facing each other for the first time this entire encounter. Their eyes lock and Lance narrows his, tries to channel his energy into it. “Stay away from Keith. Don’t come to see him, don’t text him, don’t call him, don’t even think about him. You don’t  _ deserve _ to after how you treated him tonight.”

“I understand.”

“I don’t fucking think you do.” Lance shakes his head, leans in close enough that all he can smell is the blood still dripping from Rolo’s nose occasionally. He suits him with a stare, unwavering and intense, as he drives his point home even further. “Keith Kogane is the best thing to ever happen to this world. He is sweet, funny, smart, and stronger than you’ll ever be. Don’t you  _ dare _ look down on him.”

“Okay.” Rolo repeats slowly, dazed as his eyes search Lance’s. Eventually, he comes back to his head enough to think to ask the question that’s hanging heavy between them. “Are you going to hurt me?”

“I want to.” Lance admits, reaching up to scrub a hand over his own face. “I really want to.”

“I-”

“But I won’t do that to Keith, because I’m sure somewhere inside he must care about you if he reached out to you when he needs someone most. Not his fault you weren’t worth his fucking time.” It hurts a little bit, to think that Keith has so few options in his life that a man like Rolo would ever seem like an option in the first place. More than that, it hurts that Lance wasn’t even an option. He knows that he’s messed it up for himself, but it still stings to see it so plainly.

He reaches up, cups Rolo’s jaw and keeps their eyes locked. “I’m not going to hurt you. I  _ am _ going to bite you, and you’re going to let it happen, but it won’t hurt you.”

Understanding dawns in Rolo’s eyes and then he’s nodding, groggy and unaware of what he’s approving of. Lance doesn’t wait any longer, he flattens their bodies together and nuzzles into Rolo’s neck with a neediness that has absolutely nothing to do with hunger. His mind is running on a single track, all he can think about is Keith, now more than ever with his scent lingering against Rolo’s skin.

Lance grins dopily, unintentionally pricks Rolo’s neck and laps up the blood that wells up in his leave. He forces himself not to bite yet, wants to go about it from a different angle than this. He pulls back and locks eyes with the man, nodding toward the car behind them.

“Is this beast yours?”

“Yeah.”

“Unlock it. Let’s take this inside.” The order is simple. Rolo doesn’t hesitate to turn around and climb into the backseat of the car, and Lance ducks inside after him. The car wreaks of the pine air freshener hanging from the rearview mirror, and the floor is covered in packages from various fast food places, but Lance couldn’t care less if he tried. He clambers into Rolo’s lap and goes right back to drowning himself in the secondhand scent of Keith’s body.

He bites down now, sinks his teeth into Rolo’s pulse point and eagerly drinks up everything being offered to him. Blood fills his mouth in a wave and he swallows around it with a moan, the taste mixing with Keith’s smell and confusing him. If this is a shitty substitute at best, he can only imagine what a trip it would be to actually bite Keith, to smell him directly and to taste his blood. 

Lance pretends that he is, pretends that he has Keith spread out against leather beneath him, letting out soft pleased noises as Lance savours his blood like a fine wine. It’s almost a surprise that the thought process doesn’t make him more aggressive, doesn’t have him tearing into Rolo with renewed vigor uncaring of the consequences, greedy for it. No, the thoughts of Keith have him slowing down, really lathing his tongue across damaged skin, sucking weak bruises into Rolo’s neck.

Rolo starts shifting underneath him about thirty seconds into it, and it doesn’t surprise Lance at all when he comes in his pants a few short minutes later. He doesn’t exactly seem like the type to deny himself pleasure as soon as he can get his greedy hands on it. Though, Lance can hardly talk, given how quickly he’d lost himself at the first whiff of Keith on the other man. It’d rewired his entire brain, made him forget everything else he was in the middle of doing.

Lance pulls off and lazily sucks his fangs clean, winces slightly when they retract into his gums.

He’s still hard, even though his partner came so close to the start. Lance’s cock is trapped between his legs, pressing down against Rolo’s thigh through two layers of denim. It’s aching, desperate for attention and relief. He can feel how wet his underwear are already with pre-cum. He knows it has just as much to do with Keith as it does the feeding.

“ _ Why  _ do you smell like him?” Lance asks, forcing Rolo’s head to the other direction so he can go about scenting the other side of his neck. Lance’s eyelashes flutter as his hips begin to subconsciously roll down against Rolo’s thigh, chasing after the sensation and trying to make it stretch out as far as it can. “Tell me what you and Keith did tonight. I want to know.”

The robotic tone Rolo replies in leaves much to be desired sexually, but Lance doesn’t care. He could get off on the smell of Keith alone and he’s already so close.

“I showed up. Uninvited. After our phonecall the night before, I thought he would be happy to see me. At first, he was. He hugged me when I came to the door, invited me inside. I kissed him. He kissed back. We made out on his couch, he sat in my lap just like you’re doing right now, with his arms around my neck. It wasn’t like how it used to be between us. He used to be so rough and needy for it, would push me down and climb on top and just fucking ride me until I was too sore to go on. No, tonight he was all submissive and hesitant. It was almost like he wasn’t sure if he wanted it. But he went along with it, right up until I tried to lead him to the bed. At that point, he pushed me away.”

Lance comes to the thought of Keith pushing him down onto a couch and then climbing on top of him, bouncing on his cock like a proper whore. He can imagine it, the smirk Keith would wear, the way he’d hold eye contact with Lance the entire time. He’d always found it hot, the way Keith ordered him around while they were training, pushed Lance to his limits and then some. He’d always imagined, hoped… that it would be the same if they were ever to sleep together. Rolo is painting a very pretty picture for him and it’s enough to have his hips stuttering against Rolo’s thigh, cum staining his boxers seconds later.

He gives himself a moment to come down, resting his head on Rolo’s shoulder and waiting for his head to clear of the bloodlust. Though, as the minutes pass by, he realizes it has less to do with the blood and everything to do with Keith. He groans, not even bothering to lift his head as he asks Rolo the next question.

“What happened after that? You got mad at him for not having sex with you?”

“No, that’s not why I was mad.” Rolo explains, his tone surprisingly honest given that Lance wasn’t even forcing him to answer this question. “He said that he was sorry he didn’t have feelings for me, that it was all a mistake. He said he had feelings for someone else and that I should leave. I got mad. Really mad.”

Lance freezes, eyes flying wide. He launches backward, overeager in every way, eyes finding Rolo’s in the dimly-lit backseat. His hands land on the man’s shoulders, shaking them slightly to drive the importance of the situation home. Keith has feelings for someone?! 

“Did he say who?!”

“He mentioned a guy.” Rolo breathes, leaning his head back against the headrest. “H-He said it was a client of his, or an ex-client, he didn’t say a name. It sounded like they were pretty good friends though, he claimed to know him well. It was hard not to be jealous.”

Keith isn’t exactly close with many clients and he doesn’t make an effort to know any of them. He makes a point to keep all of his client relationships strictly professional, says it makes it harder to blur the lines and try to continue training them without that initial level of respect. He’s adamant about it, makes no exceptions to the rule… except Lance.

Should he dare to hope? Dare to believe that he might be so lucky?

“Forget you ever saw me. Forget about the bite. Go home… and stay away from Keith.” Lance tells Rolo, climbing off his lap with a bit of a clumsy struggle. Rolo watches after him indifferently, letting him climb out of the car without another question about what just transpired. Lance doesn’t even look back, he just immediately heads for where he actually wants to be right now.

He jumps up the steps of the gym two at a time, excitement growing unbearable the closer he gets. He can’t wipe the giddy smile from his face no matter how he tries. He knocks on the door three times, rocking back on the heels of his shoes as he waits for Keith to answer. Except he doesn’t, and Lance knocks again, with slightly more insistence.

A couple minutes pass. Still no movement from the other side of the door.

A quick glance around the side of the building proves that Keith’s bike is still in the drive, and Lance can’t imagine he’d be traveling anywhere on foot at this hour of the night. So what gives? Does he know it’s Lance visiting and not want to see him?

“Keith!” Lance shouts, focusing to listen for any sign of life beyond the door. The more he concentrates, the further his range seems to go. He doesn’t hear Keith, but he does hear the quiet static of 80’s music through shitty headphones. That would explain why Keith hadn’t heard him.

Lance walks around to the side window with the intention of knocking on it to get Keith’s attention, a fierce determination taking over him to sort things out now and no later. He can’t wait anymore, especially not if Keith feels anywhere near the same for him. They can figure out the rest later. Lance knows he won’t hurt him, not when he fed literally minutes ago. It has to be now.

But… he stops just short of letting his knuckles graze the glass. He catches sight of Keith in the small lobby of the gym easily. He sticks out like a sore thumb, curled up in the office chair at the front desk. His feet are up on the chair, knees hugged tightly to his chest, face buried into his arms and hood up over his head to hide it from view. He looks small. Fragile.

And when he lifts his head, reaching for his phone to change the song, it’s impossible to miss the tear tracks streaking down either side of his face. The same way Lance doesn’t miss the wince, the way he snatches the tissue box off the desk and grabs a handful to mash into his face, like he’s angry about the fact he’s crying at all. But just as soon as the anger appears, it’s replaced with more exhausted sadness.

Lance stands there stock still, watching in horror as Keith’s shoulders slump and shake, sobs wracking his frame as he buries his face further into his hands.

He’d been so blindly hopeful that Keith harboured feelings for him, that they felt the same this whole time… he hadn’t really stopped to think twice about what that might mean. Lance had been going through hell battling with his feelings and keeping his distance from Keith, and he _ knew _ why it was happening. 

Keith didn’t know. Keith had to battle his feelings all alone, left completely in the dark. How hard Keith must be taking his absence, how hurt he must have been seeing Lance with other people, how stupid he must feel for opening up only to have Lance walk away. 

Lance thought he was doing the right thing, keeping Keith safe from harm by keeping his distance.

“Keith.” Lance breathes quietly, pressing his hand to the glass. 

Keith looks up suddenly, in his direction, but Lance is already gone. He blends back into the shadows, headed home with a lot on his mind and a newfound urgency building in his chest. He has to fix this.

\--

Lance pushes the doors open, listens to the telltale chime of the bell overhead.

It feels weird stepping into the gym again after spending so long away. He notices things that he didn’t the night before, when he’d been too caught up in Keith to really register anything else. Now, he can’t help but take note of every little thing that’s changed, from something as small as the new flyers posted on the bulletin board, to the more glaringly obvious new additions of _ Christmas decorations  _ strewn haphazardly around the room.

He lingers at the front desk, drums his fingers against the solid hardwood and eyes the box of tissues sitting atop it with a clarity that he almost wishes he didn’t have. There’s no forgetting it now. The image of Keith crying had been seared into the backs of his eyelids, the only thing he could possibly think about ever since. He’d spent hours that night thinking about it, desperately wishing he’d done things differently and fixed this sooner. So yes, at the crack of dawn, Lance dressed himself in his usual gym clothes and headed out the door to catch his Monday morning appointment.

For the first time in a month.

In truth, Lance could just head into the workout area and seek Keith out. There’s no reason for him to linger here by the front desk, blindly hoping that Keith heard the chime of the door and will come to greet him. He’s been here enough times that he’s more than capable of inviting himself in.

But Lance needs more time to prepare himself for what happens next, needs to stand right there in the lobby and refamiliarize himself with the place that’d been his second home for such a long while. It feels strangely similar to coming back home to Cuba for a visit after too long away, equal parts relieving and painful both at once. It’s good to be back, but it also makes him painstakingly aware of what he’s been missing while he was gone. He wished he was here to help with this... if only to tell Keith that he should choose a color theme  _ before _ he buys the decorations because the warm reds and greens mixed with the cool colors of blue and white really clash in the worst of ways and-

“Seriously? What are you _ doing _ here?”

It’s not fair. 

He still needs more _time_.

He’s out of time. Keith is standing there in the doorway, a water bottle in hand and a pleasant flush to his cheeks, his hair still wet from a shower and tied into a bun at the back of his head. Lance promptly forgets what he came here for, forgets all the itemized lists of things to say that he’d made in his head throughout the night. All he knows is that he desperately, desperately missed this.

Keith isn’t smiling. His lips are set in a tight unreadable line, eyes cold and distant. His walls are up and they loom higher than ever before, lined in barbed wire and utterly impossible to scale. He looks  _ mean _ , and it’s a stark contrast from the soft smiles and laughter they’d once shared. 

It doesn’t help that he smells so damn good Lance is almost afraid his fangs might show up at the least opportune of moments, despite having fed from Rolo just twelve hours beforehand. It’s enough to have him nervously ducking his head, staring down at the floor between them rather than looking Keith directly in the eye. He buries his hands in his pockets, tries and fails to find the right words.

“I’m here for my appointment?” It’s the best he’s got. It took him nearly a full minute to come up with that and he’s running with it. He glances up through his lashes, looks over to where Keith is staring him down like a hawk. Lance can practically hear the gears in his mind turning, trying with all his might to make sense of the situation, to predetermine how to feel and how to act.

“You lost your booking. Tough luck.” Keith says finally, voice even, as meticulously controlled as all of his other reactions. 

What Keith’s saying makes sense, he’s not sure why he thought that he wouldn’t have lost his booking by now. Any other business probably wouldn’t even give him a week’s window for error, let alone a month. He just thought Keith would make an exception for him, that’s all.

“I paid in advance. Six month’s worth of training. I have it in writing.” 

Lance is copying Keith now, his voice just as filtered, until it’s void of emotion completely. This is the strangest confrontation he’s ever had, the both of them refusing to express even an ounce of emotion that’s so clearly boiling beneath the surface. He’d known that Keith wasn’t exactly the best at feelings, but this is worse than he could have ever expected.

“If someone doesn’t show up for an entire month then it’s usually safe to assume they aren’t coming back. I’m not gonna sit around waiting on them indefinitely, especially when they don’t have the decency to cancel or reschedule ahead of time. If that’s all, I have clients to attend to. Um, bye.”

Lance’s jaw drops as Keith spins around on his heel and starts marching back into the gym, head held high and shoulders set back behind himself. He doesn’t even glance back once, disappearing from sight into the other room just like that. He’s acting completely unaffected, but if Lance concentrates he can hear the way his heart is racing in his chest, vibrating like a hummingbird it’s so flighty and spastic. 

Damn it, Keith.

Lance jogs after him, catches up to him halfway across the room and grabs his hand.

Big mistake. Big, big mistake. Partly because Lance is immediately awed by the softness and the warmth of his hand, can’t help but to let out an amazed little squee. But more than that, it’s a mistake because it pisses Keith the fuck off, has him ripping his hand free and storming away from Lance with even more speed behind his gait. Lance groans, trailing after him like a lost puppy.

“Keith, come on.” Lance pleads, earning nothing but silence for his struggles. “You’re seriously gonna give me the silent treatment right now?”

Big mistake number two, yep. In Lance’s defense, he realizes this one is a mistake even before Keth seems to, as soon as the words tumble past his lips. The irony of it is raw and cruel, being demanded attention the second he asks for it when he’s been depriving Keith for far longer. Keith whips back around to gape at him, hurt flashing in his eyes like he truly can’t believe that Lance just said that. 

“Get the fuck out.” Keith snarls at him, quickly morphing into that same feral being that’d been standing on the front steps of the gym the night before. All of the emotion he’d been holding back behind the dam washes forward now, in one devastating tsunami of a wave. His eyes well up with unshed tears, narrowing into an angry glare that’s only made slightly less intimidating by the rapid blinking.

“At least hear me out! I-”

“I  _ was  _ willing to hear you out! Weeks ago!” Keith shouts, throwing his hands up in the air. Lance flinches backward, shoulders hiked up around his shoulders. They’ve drawn the attention of the entire room now and though it’s relatively quiet this early on a Monday morning, having even six different patrons watching their quarrel is less than desirable. Especially because Lance can tell they’re all silently judging him for being so dang awful at navigating it.

“I’m sorry!”

“I don’t care! Fuck you!” Keith keeps yelling like he can’t get himself to stop now, shaking with anger as he stands there staring Lance down and begging him to fight it. Lance doesn’t rise to the challenge, not like Rolo did the night before, but he doesn’t leave either. He stays rooted to the spot, staring hopefully back at Keith. Keith is having none of it. “Get out! Right now! This is a privately-owned establishment and you’re not welcome here! Out!”

“Keith, please. I’m sorry. I can explain. I can fix this, I-”

“Hey, is there a problem here?” The voice that interrupts him is surprisingly kind, warm and friendly like a customer service worker. Lance slowly closes his mouth, turning to look at the absolute wall of muscle of a man that’s come to stand beside them. He’s wearing booty shorts and a skin-tight tank top, with a white tuft dyed into his otherwise black hair. Lance has never met this guy before, but he immediately feels like he knows all he needs to know about him.

Then he goes and places a hand on Keith’s shoulder, lingering and gentle… and something in Lance snaps the slightest bit. It feels like this man is taunting him, as he squeezes Keith’s shoulder in a comforting grip and steps closer to him, looming over Keith like he’s  _ his _ to protect. 

Keith is  _ not _ his.

“Who the hell do you think you are?” Lance scoffs, marching straight up to the man and glaring up at him. Slowly, he reaches out and pings the stranger… right on his stupidly-defined left tit. “Does this look like any of your business? Go back to the treadmills, himbo.”

“Lance!” Keith hisses out in what can only be described as complete and utter mortification. Lance pauses, lights up at the first sign of something that _ isn’t _ explicit hatred and anger being broadcasted in his direction. Though, Keith looks so frazzled and flustered, Lance isn’t sure this is better. He’s blushing so red he almost looks neon. What does this  _ mean _ ?

Keith steps forward, pushes Lance aside so he can stand in front of the himbo, and now it’s his turn to take on a protective air like that giant man is in any need of support in this fight. Keith looks up at him, then back at Lance, face still flushed. “This is my  _ brother _ Shiro. He’s helping me out with the gym now.”

Oh.

“Oh.”

“And even if it wasn’t, that is no way to talk to my fucking clients.” Keith follows up with in an angry mutter, surging forward and grabbing Lance by the hair. Lance yelps like a dog, but even though he could definitely manage, he doesn’t attempt to pull away. He lets Keith manhandle him under his arm in a chokehold, relishes the closeness like a starved man as he’s pulled from the room by his neck.

He can feel the muscles in Keith’s bicep bulging against his throat, can feel the blood pulsing just beneath the surface of pale skin. It’s so warm, it smells like heaven. It’s pure bliss, nirvana. Lance’s eyes might even roll back a little, utterly overwhelmed by the assault to his senses. It doesn’t even surprise him when his fangs slice through his gums a moment later. Ah, damn it.

Next thing he knows, Lance’s uncontrollable boner problem will make a comeback.

… He cannot let that happen.

“ _ Keith _ , this hurts! Ow, ow, ow!” Lance whines, desperate to put some space between him and Keith before he’s called out for being such a horny bastard. He even puts some strength behind his thrashing, but Keith’s grip is weirdly strong, digging straight into a pressure point or something that has Lance stumbling over his feet. It doesn’t hurt, but it has Lance feeling oddly weak and out of touch with his own body. Damn Keith and his mysterious ways.

Keith’s grip doesn’t relent at all when they reach the lobby. He keeps tugging Lance along like a misbehaving dog, dragging him toward a set of stairs that Lance has never been on before. Keith pulls him up one step by one, until suddenly they’re standing in the middle of a quaint little bachelor apartment. And Lance belatedly realizes that Keith just forcibly hauled him by the scruff of his neck straight into his  _ home _ .

A snively little grin worms its way across Lance’s face before he can stop it.

Lance looks around the room as fast as he can, catalogues everything he’s seeing into one of the faraway recesses of his mind. There are vinyl records lining the wall on one side of the room, there’s a shag carpet on the floor of all fucking things, and there’s a surprising amount of mess around the otherwise minimalist space. It looks out of place, when all of the shelves and cupboards look to be sorted so meticulously. Like maybe Keith hasn’t cleaned in a few weeks...

Keith lets go of him with a shove and walks away, falling onto a couch in the middle of the open-concept room. Lance hesitates where he’s standing, unsure if he’s allowed to follow, unsure if he even  _ should  _ when his fangs are aching for attention like this. And Keith isn’t even fucking saying anything, he’s just leaning back in his seat and staring at Lance, with this condescending little head tilt and frown. It’s anything but inviting.

“You are one awfully entitled bastard to storm back in here and start acting like you own the place.”

“Keith, I know you’re mad at me. That’s fair, I guess. But I’m really serious about this and I wanna make it work, I just had a lot going on in my personal life and-”

“I’ll give you a refund.” Keith cuts him off with a sigh, pushing his hips up off the couch with a grunt. In any other context, Lance would rejoice to see Keith in this position, with his legs spread and feet firmly planted in the cushions for support, his shirt sliding up his chest and revealing a slither of smooth skin that’s normally left hidden. 

As it is, he just sulks as he watches Keith pull his wallet out of his back pocket and flick through the bills inside to find the proper change. Lance’s heart drops to his feet. “Clearly we didn’t work well together as a team and you need to have that trust with a fitness trainer. I’d suggest looking into other gyms around town. I hear there’s a really nice one that’s opened up on Arthur street.”

“Keith, don’t do this.” Lance whispers, just loud enough that he’s sure Keith can hear it from the other side of the room, even if he makes no effort to look up from his hands. Lance sighs long and hard when Keith continues to count out the money as if he’d never heard him. Petty. “We worked great together as a team and you know it, so what are you on about?”

Keith pauses.

Keith biffs a wallet full of money in Lance’s general direction, sending coins scattering across the floor.

“Then what was the goddamn problem?!” Keith shouts, jumping to his feet and marching over to Lance in a flurry of curse words. Lance doesn’t back down, not even when Keith grabs a fistful of his gym shirt and yanks him closer by that alone. “Why did you ghost me for a month,  _ huh _ ?!”

“It’s complicated.” 

“It’s really not.” Keith argues, shaking his head so hurriedly that some strands of hair slip free of the elastic they’re bound in. They fall around Keith’s neck, curling there. “If you cared about me you would have given me something to work with. You don’t completely ghost people you care about, Lance. You don’t leave them on read and leave them to wonder what they did wrong. You didn’t make the slightest effort to explain it to me. I was  _ worried _ about you and you didn’t offer me  _ anything _ , you asshole.”

“Did you ever think that maybe the worry was warranted and I just didn’t know how to explain what was going on?! I mean, damn it, I haven’t even talked to my fucking family or Hunk about this!” 

“Then why didn’t you _ say  _ that! You could have given me something to work with, literally anything! I thought things were going really well between us and then you were just  _ gone _ .” Keith’s voice wobbles, breaks on the last word. Then the waterworks are back, tears gathering in his eyes so suddenly that they’re spilling over within seconds. It’s different now though, now that Keith is standing right in front of him, isn’t some untouchable being on the other side of the glass.

Before Lance can hesitate, he stumbles forward and throws his arms around Keith’s trembling shoulders.

For a terrifying moment, Keith freezes up like he’s going to pull away and reject the hug. It wouldn’t be unheard of, even before all of this had come between them, Lance would have been hesitant to try and hug Keith. He was much like a cat when it came to physical attention, in the sense that the only time it was truly safe to touch him and be sure to get a positive reaction, was when Keith had initiated it. And sometimes not even then.

Keith doesn’t pull away this time though. In fact, his hands even come to rest on either side of Lance’s waist, so uncertain that they’re barely noticeable over the fabric of his shirt. Lance pulls him in closer, tries to ignore the way his instincts are going absolutely wild being this close to the best-smelling blood he’s ever caught scent of. He’s extra careful not to speak with a lisp now.

“Obviously I wanted to reach out, Keith. Every text you sent was a special kind of torture. I just didn’t want to involve you in this mess I’ve gotten myself into, okay? You said you’re trying to move forward and start fresh, I don’t want to be the thing that bogs you down and holds you back.” Lance explains, his voice earnest. It’s not the whole truth, but at least it isn’t a lie. “That doesn’t mean that I don’t care about you. If anything, wanting to keep you out of all of this is a testament to how  _ much _ I care. I was trying to protect you, I promise.”

For a few blissful moments after Lance finishes speaking, neither of them rush to fill the silence. They simply stand there together, holding onto one another. Keith sniffles quietly into Lance’s shoulder, hiding his face completely from view until he’s composed himself. Slowly, his breath evens out again.

“What the hell’s all of that supposed to  _ mean _ ? You get yourself into some shit, McClain?” Keith mumbles eventually, into the fabric of Lance’s shirt. He pulls back then, but not far. They’re still clinging to each other, but Keith is determined to look into his eyes for this next question. His expression is surprisingly open and free of judgment as he searches Lance’s face for answers. “What is it, drugs?”

“It’s not drugs.” Lance dismisses with a scoff, shaking his head. “It’s not fucking drugs, Keith.”

“Is it mental health stuff? You know you can talk to me about it. I… I understand more than you probably think I do. We’ve all been there.” 

“I won’t lie, it’s definitely taken a toll on my mental health, but that’s not where it started.”

“Is it something worse than drugs? You involved in a gang? I know some people. Some bad people... but they owe me favors. I could-”

“Jesus Christ, Keith, what the hell? Gangs?! You got some seedy past you’re keeping a secret from me?!” 

“Like you’re one to talk when it comes to keeping secrets!” Keith fires back, feisty as ever. It throws Lance for a loop, has him rethinking what he’s said and groaning into his hand. 

“I really want to tell you, honest,” Keith’s expression softens. “I just don’t think that’s an option right now. I understand if that’s a dealbreaker and you want me to leave. Even if you’re still mad at me, I get it. I’m sorry I can’t offer you anything more than this, but it’s how it is.”

Lance closes his eyes. He can’t bear to watch the emotions flicker across Keith’s face, to feel the suspense of wondering if this is the end of the road for them or not.

“You’re such an idiot.” But it’s not an insult anymore, it’s fond and exasperated, like Keith has accepted this about him and isn’t allowing it to change how he feels. Things are still tense, but it’s closer to how they used to be than anything else they’ve said. Lance chuckles lowly, giving Keith a wink.

“Yeah.” Lance sighs tiredly, pulling Keith back into his chest and rejoicing at how easily Keith goes along with it all. He snuggles into the space Lance makes for him there, radiating warmth that has Lance holding onto him all the more tighter. Lance tips his head back, stares up at the ceiling and tries to use his tongue to push his fangs back up. “Yeah, I am.”

“No, I mean it, you’re stupid.” Keith repeats himself with a little bit more conviction, an indignant little huff leaving his lips in a hot breath of air across Lance’s jaw. Lance rolls his eyes fondly, knowing exactly what’s coming to him now even before Keith pulls out of his hold. He puts a foot of space between them and suits Lance with a stern look. “I don’t  _ need  _ anyone to protect me, I can handle myself. You said it yourself weeks ago, you’re a twig compared to me. If anyone needs protecting, it’s you, trust me.” 

It’s said with so much seriousness, with that unfairly hot gruff voice Keith takes on sometimes that lets Lance know the time to bullshit is over, when they’re working out together and Keith wants him to stop goofing off and actually get back to work. He reaches out and places a hand on Lance’s arm, his grip firm.

And the thing is, Lance knows that Keith means every word. He really and truly believes that he should be the one standing up for Lance, not the other way around. The sentiment is very nice, Lance has always wanted a strong capable man to look out for him and treat him good. It’s just, well, he’s also very plainly aware of the fact that Keith is wrong. Lance knows what he is, and in need of protection just isn’t it. If anything, the world needs protection from him.

He plays it off though, offers Keith a playful smile.

“I know, I know. You’re a certified badass and I’m not, sooner or later I’ll have to accept that.”

“Shut-up, that’s not what I-” Lance doesn’t let him finish, doesn’t want to stay on this topic. They’ve had their time to protect each other, it fucking sucked. Lance doesn’t want to think about that, he just wants to live in the moment, to enjoy the fact that he’s finally next to Keith again. 

Besides, despite explaining himself to the best of his ability, Lance isn’t finished what he came here to do in the first place. The image of Keith crying, presumably over him, isn’t something that he can dismiss and move on from so easily. He doesn’t think that Keith can either, no matter how he lies to himself and pretends he’s stronger than his emotions. Lance wants to do this right.

“Keith, I… I don’t know where to start.” Lance licks his lips, breathing a sigh of relief when his fangs suddenly disappear into his gums again. Keith is staring at him expectantly, wide-eyed with hitched breath, like he’s more nervous about what Lance is about to say than Lance himself is. “I’m sorry, Keith. I am so fucking sorry for what I did to you. I hurt you. There is no excuse, no explanation that makes that okay. The last thing I ever wanted was to make you think I didn’t care. I care about you so much. I need you to know that.”

“You have a weird way of showing it.” Keith dismisses with an awkward laugh, immediately trying to lighten the mood the second emotions come into the conversation. He’s blushing up a storm, determined to avoid eye contact since the moment Lance started speaking from the heart.

“I know I do.” Lance agrees, running his fingers through his hair. He leans into Keith’s space, knocking their shoulders together. Keith side-eyes him, trying and failing to hide his smile. “Forgive me? Give me one more chance.”

“One more chance to do what?” Keith pries, though his eyes are sparkling with a level of mischief that says he knows very well what Lance is asking for. Ah well, Lance figures he deserves a little bit of a hard time after all he’s done to Keith. He’ll play along happily.

“To come back to the gym and get fit, obviously.” Lance responds, playing right along and acting just as oblivious as Keith. “Where am I gonna find another trainer that knows how to handle _ all of this _ as well as you do? You know my body better than I do. My ass has never looked better and that’s all thanks to your gentle yet firm hand.”

“You’re not funny.” Keith deadpans, raising a single eyebrow at him. Lance is smiling so hard his cheeks hurt, glad his fangs disappeared when they did because even that wouldn’t be reason enough to keep from grinning now. Keith just looks so at ease, so happy.

“Let’s do this, one more shot at this thing between us.”

“What thing? There’s a thing? No one informed me of a thing?”

“ _ Keith _ .”

“I’m not gonna turn my back on you when you need me, alright?” Keith manages through his laughter, letting it slowly filter out. He steps closer, claps Lance on the back and starts leading him back down the stairs. Lance leans into his side, utterly content to be so close to him. 

“That means a lot to me, Keith.”

“Don’t mention it. I trust you know what’s best for the situation you’re in. Just know that I’m here and you don’t have to shut me out completely. I’m not some naive idiot, okay? I’ve been through a lot and I’m still kicking. I can help. Let me help.” Keith reaches down between them, grabbing Lance’s hand and giving it a gentle squeeze. He lets go just as quickly though, when they reach the bottom of the stairs and catch sight of Shiro sitting at the front desk in the lobby.

They linger where they are, not ready to let go of their moment yet.

Lance turns to Keith with a bashful little grin, mindful of the fact that Shiro can probably hear them from here. It’s not enough to stop him from wanting to spend as much time as possible with Keith, though.

“So, how’s your Wednesday schedule looking?” 

“7am. Sharp. Don’t be fucking late this time, I mean it.”

“I’ll bring you that coffee.”

“You’d better. Better be the best goddamn coffee of my life.” Keith giggles, a bubbly sweet noise that Lance immediately decides he wants to hear a million times more. It draws the attention of Shiro, who pulls the chair back from the desk with an audible scrape across the floor, making damn sure everyone is aware of his presence. When Lance looks over at him, he’s a looming shroud of darkness, and now it’s all the more clear that what he’d been channeling earlier had been protective older brother energy.

Shiro meets Lance’s gaze, his face completely blank and yet so judgmental.

Slowly, conspiratorially, Lance lifts his hand to cover his face from Shiro’s direction and whispers to Keith from the corner of his mouth. Keith is still smiling, uncaring of his brother’s threatening stance on the other side of the room. That’s Lance’s battle and Lance’s alone.

“Should I bring one for Shiro too?”

“He likes three sugars  _ and _ three creams, he doesn’t even want that shit to taste anything like coffee, you hear me? If it isn’t a syrup consistency, he doesn’t want it. Good luck getting back onto his good side, by the way, you have your work cut out for you.”

“Ugh.” Lance groans long and hard, catches the unimpressed look both Shiro and Keith shoot his way in response. Yeah, it’s clear now that they’re brothers, even though they’re adopted and their features aren’t incredibly similar. That sassy displeased expression they’re both wearing is nearly identical. “I mean, not that I… don’t deserve it. I would be  _ happy _ to work for his approval.”

“Yeah, yeah.”

“I’m really sorry, Keith.” Lance repeats himself, more genuine. 

“Prove it, McClain.” 

After that, Keith explains that he has to get back to his clients, though he seems reluctant. Lance understands though, wouldn’t want Keith to prioritize him over his passion. So Keith walks him to the door, and Shiro hurriedly pretends to be invested in his work at they pass him by. 

Keith leans against the door with his arms crossed over his chest, and watches Lance walk down the steps. He nearly trips over himself twice, too distracted looking back at Keith. “I’ll see you soon, Lance.”

“You can count on it. You will be seeing _ a lot _ more of me from here on out. More than you could ever hope for. You’re gonna see so much of it that you get sick of me. You’re gonna-”

“I get it, Lance.” Keith cuts him off. Lance knew he was rambling, silently curses himself for it, accepts that he probably annoyed Keith. He’s about to pick up his pride and turn away, hurry home to overthink the exchange that took place just now, but Keith speaks up again and he freezes in his tracks. “Lance?”

“Yeah?”

“I think you’re underestimating how much of you I want to see.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HAPPY HORNY NEW YEARS!!! It feels so good to be back. In the spirit of honesty, I may have burnt myself out in October. I was passionate, having fun, and horny. I regret nothing. Anyway I've recharged, I'm rejuvenated, and I'm ready to pick up where I left off and fuck monsters once again. Thank you for your continued support.
> 
> As I mentioned in the top note, I've updated the tags. This story has no direction and thus it's really getting away from me, I'm just writing own my kinks at this point. If y'all can think of ANYTHING else I should tag this as, please let me know. As I'm posting this I'm a little bit drunk at a New Year's EVe minecraft party, so it's very possible I've forgotten something important and if so I am sincerely story.
> 
> You may be asking yourself,,, why is the second chapter of this story 3x the length of the first chapter... and to that i say........ hhhhhhhhheh?????????? dunto. I could split it up into two chapters, but to be perfectly honest I just want all the angst to be out of the way. I came here for the ROMANCE, for the flirting, for the fucking... i am tired of them not talking ok
> 
> SOCIAL MEDIAS!
> 
> @melancholymango - my main twitter acc, my tumblr  
@redgaysonly - my horny nsfw twitter acc where I post threads and talk about my fics


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